Application of Intelligent-Objects Simulation to Manufacturing Process Efficiency Analysis: A Case Study

A thesis presented to the faculty of the College of Science and Technology at Morehead State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Science by Justin Hamilton on May 12, 2012

Effects Of Prescribed Burning On Grassland Nesting Birds On Conservation Reserve Program Areas In Gove County, Kansas

Great Plains grasslands were once one of the largest ecosystems in North America. However, farming, ranching, urban development, widespread fire suppression, and numerous other factors have created a great loss of this habitat in central North America. Organisms that depend on that habitat, such as grassland nesting birds, also have declined. The Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), which was established in 1985, paid landowners to remove land with highly erodible soils from production and plant it with perennial vegetation. Increases in CRP acreages brought about increases in numbers of several bird species that were in decline before the program existed. Prescribed burning is a management tool that has been used extensively in the tallgrass prairie to set back succession. The effects of prescribed burning on grassland nesting birds in the tallgrass prairie are well documented. Research shows some species to be more abundant in areas that have been burned recently, while others are more abundant in less disturbed grasslands. However, limited research has been conducted on the effects of prescribed burning on grassland nesting birds in the mixed grass prairie ecosystem. The objectives of my research were to assess the effects of prescribed burning on vegetation, nest site selection and nest success, brown-headed cowbird (Molothrus ater) brood parasitism of grassland birds, and on insect biomass on CRP stands in the mixed grass prairie region of western Kansas. My research took place during the breeding seasons of 2008 and 2009. In 2008, I monitored 80 nests from 9 avian species in burned and unburned areas of CRP. In 2009, I monitored 109 nests from 7 avian species on burned, unburned, and one year post burned areas of CRP. The mourning dove (Zenaida macroura) was the most abundant species observed in both years of research. My results showed no significant difference in nest density and daily survival probability of grassland nesting birds on burned and unburned areas in 2008 and burned, unburned, and one year post burned areas in 2009. Brown-headed cowbird brood parasitism was not detected in 2008 and only occurred in 2 nests in 2009. A significant difference was observed in insect biomass between the months of June, July, and August for both 2008 and 2009 with biomass greatest in August. A significant difference in insect biomass also occurred between burned, unburned, and one year post burned areas in 2009 with biomass greatest in unburned areas. However, no significant difference occurred in insect biomass between burned and unburned treatments in 2008. Significant differences in vegetation characteristics also occurred between burned and unburned areas in 2008, and among burned, unburned, and one year post burned areas in 2009. A significant difference in vegetation characteristics between nest sites and random points was also observed in 2008 with percentages of forbs being greater on random sites. This difference was not observed in 2009, however. My results indicated prescribed burning had no effect on nest density or daily survival probability of grassland nesting birds. However, burning did have a significant difference on vegetation characteristics and might have contributed to differences in insect biomass. Thus, prescribed burning is a management tool that can be used to interrupt succession and create heterogeneity on the landscape. However, more research should be conducted on the effects of prescribed burning on vegetation, insects, and grassland nesting birds in the mixed grass prairie

Justin Isenhour and Eneida Larti in a Faculty Recital

This is the program for the faculty recital featuring trombone player Justin Isenhour, pianist Eneida Larti, and trumpet player Craig Hamilton. This recital took place on February 28, 2012, in the W. Francis McBeth Recital Hall

Faculty Showcase Recital

This is the program for the faculty showcase recital featuring the following artists (in order of performance): horn player Heather Thayer, trumpet player Craig Hamilton, trombonist Justin Isenhour; soprano Robin Williams, baritone John Alec Briggs, pianist Susan Monroe; tenor David Stanley and Susan Monroe; soprano Glenda Secrest, tenor Jon Secrest, and Susan Monroe; xylophonist Ryan Lewis and pianist John Alec Briggs; mezzo soprano Suzetta Glenn and pianist Kristen La Madrid; soprano Margaret Garrett and Susan Monroe; the OBU Choral and Vocal Faculty with Susan Monroe; pianists Lei Cai and Adam Hass. This recital took place on September 12, 2014, in the W. Francis McBeth Recital Hall

Who witnesses The Witness? Finding witnesses in The Witness is hard and sometimes impossible

We analyze the computational complexity of the many types of pencil-and-paper-style puzzles featured in the 2016 puzzle video game The Witness. In all puzzles, the goal is to draw a simple path in a rectangular grid graph from a start vertex to a destination vertex. The different puzzle types place different constraints on the path: preventing some edges from being visited (broken edges); forcing some edges or vertices to be visited (hexagons); forcing some cells to have certain numbers of incident path edges (triangles); or forcing the regions formed by the path to be partially monochromatic (squares), have exactly two special cells (stars), or be singly covered by given shapes (polyominoes) and/or negatively counting shapes (antipolyominoes). We show that any one of these clue types (except the first) is enough to make path finding NP-complete ("witnesses exist but are hard to find"), even for rectangular boards. Furthermore, we show that a final clue type (antibody), which necessarily "cancels" the effect of another clue in the same region, makes path finding $\Sigma_2$-complete ("witnesses do not exist"), even with a single antibody (combined with many anti/polyominoes), and the problem gets no harder with many antibodies. On the positive side, we give a polynomial-time algorithm for monomino clues, by reducing to hexagon clues on the boundary of the puzzle, even in the presence of broken edges, and solving "subset Hamiltonian path" for terminals on the boundary of an embedded planar graph in polynomial time.Comment: 72 pages, 59 figures. Revised proof of Lemma 3.5. A short version of this paper appeared at the 9th International Conference on Fun with Algorithms (FUN 2018

South Skagit Highway realignment: ENVS 493 winter 2013

The existing placement of the South Skagit Highway disconnects the Skagit River from approximately 62 acres of floodplain in the project area alone and has direct impacts on habitat conditions. Approximately, 5.2 acres of wetlands are completely inaccessible to fish due to the current highway alignment. An additional 21.7 acres of slough and wetland habitat have only partial fish access due to restricted hydrologic connectivity with the river. Routine dredging and maintenance is required for the 900 feet of Savage Creek which currently runs in the highway ditch. Savage Slough runs under the highway through an undersized culvert that is often blocked by flooding from Mill Creek. An alluvial fan of Mill Creek runs under an undersized bridge making the channel prone to migration, avulsion, and erosion. The channel has been subject to numerous maintenance projects, including dredging and channelization. Seattle City Light (SCL) purchased approximately 212 acres of property on the Skagit River near Mill and Savage Creeks. A large portion of the acquired property has been deforested and disturbed by the South Skagit Highway, which runs through the Skagit River\u27s floodplain and disconnects a variety of existing tributary and wetland habitats. In order to implement habitat restoration and protect the property for conservation, SCL has been working with Skagit River System Cooperative (SRSC) and Skagit County to restore the floodplain to its original ecological functionality, providing habitat for several species. Maintenance costs of the current road would also be reduced. The restoration is likely to include demolition, riparian and floodplain plantings, and culvert removals. Possibilities for floodplain restoration were evaluated after an initial scoping procedure. Suggested restoration would either demolish and realign the existing road or install new bridges and culverts on the existing road. The initial scoping and evaluation narrowed the list of feasible projects down to two, mostly due to the Washington State Department of Transportation\u27s (WSDOT) high cost estimate of the other projects. Project funding has come from both SCL and the Salmon Recovery Funding Board (SRFB, project #091450) and several additional sources

Proteinase-activated receptors in GtoPdb v.2023.1

Proteinase-activated receptors (PARs, nomenclature as agreed by the NC-IUPHAR Subcommittee on Proteinase-activated Receptors [39]) are unique members of the GPCR superfamily activated by proteolytic cleavage of their amino terminal exodomains. Agonist proteinase-induced hydrolysis unmasks a tethered ligand (TL) at the exposed amino terminus, which acts intramolecularly at the binding site in the body of the receptor to effect transmembrane signalling. TL sequences at human PAR1-4 are SFLLRN-NH2, SLIGKV-NH2, TFRGAP-NH2 and GYPGQV-NH2, respectively. With the exception of PAR3, synthetic peptides with these sequences (as carboxyl terminal amides) are able to act as agonists at their respective receptors. Several proteinases, including neutrophil elastase, cathepsin G and chymotrypsin can have inhibitory effects at PAR1 and PAR2 such that they cleave the exodomain of the receptor without inducing activation of Gαq-coupled calcium signalling, thereby preventing activation by activating proteinases but not by agonist peptides. Neutrophil elastase (NE) cleavage of PAR1 and PAR2 can however activate MAP kinase signaling by exposing a TL that is different from the one revealed by trypsin [87]. PAR2 activation by NE regulates inflammation and pain responses [115, 76] and triggers mucin secretion from airway epithelial cells [116]

Essential role of platelet activation via protease activated receptor 4 in tissue factor-initiated inflammation

INTRODUCTION: Tissue factor (TF) activation of the coagulation proteases enhances inflammation in animal models of arthritis and endotoxemia, but the mechanism of this effect is not yet fully understood - in particular, whether this is primarily due to fibrin formation or through activation of protease activated receptors (PARs). METHODS: We induced extravascular inflammation by injection of recombinant soluble murine TF (sTF1-219) in the hind paw. The effects of thrombin inhibition, fibrinogen and platelet depletion were evaluated, as well as the effects of PAR deficiency using knockout mice deficient for each of the PARs. RESULTS: Injection of soluble TF provoked a rapid onset of paw swelling. Inflammation was confirmed histologically and by increased serum IL-6 levels. Inflammation was significantly reduced by depletion of fibrinogen (P < 0.05) or platelets (P = 0.015), and by treatment with hirudin (P = 0.04) or an inhibitor of activated factor VII (P < 0.001) compared with controls. PAR-4-deficient mice exhibited significantly reduced paw swelling (P = 0.003). In contrast, a deficiency in either PAR-1, PAR-2 or PAR-3 did not affect the inflammatory response to soluble TF injection. CONCLUSION: Our results show that soluble TF induces acute inflammation through a thrombin-dependent pathway and both fibrin deposition and platelet activation are essential steps in this process. The activation of PAR-4 on platelets is crucial and the other PARs do not play a major role in soluble TF-induced inflammation