Frostburg State University

ABSTRACT The emergence of numerous learning style models over the past 25 years has brought increasing attention to the idea that students learn in diverse ways and that one approach to teaching does not work for every student or even most students. We have reviewed five learning style instruments (the Kolb Learning Style Indicator, the Gregorc Style Delineator, the Felder–Silverman Index of Learning Styles, the VARK Questionnaire, and the Dunn and Dunn Productivity Environmental Preference Survey) in this article in order to describe the learning style modes or dimensions measured in the instruments; find the common measures and the differences; report on research on instrument validity, reliability, and possible improvement in student performance; suggest classroom activities that work with the different student learning styles; and recommend selection of models under several conditions. We also review one additional learning style instrument, the Revised Approaches to Studying Inventory, as a complementary approach to using one or more of the first five learning style instruments.

Efforts to resolve Darwin's "abominable mystery"-the origin of angiosperms-have led to the conclusion that Gnetales and various fossil groups are sister to angiosperms, forming the "anthophytes." Morphological homologies, however, are difficult to interpret, and molecular data have not provided clear resolution of relationships among major groups of seed plants. We introduce two sequence data sets from slowly evolving mitochondrial genes, cox1 and atpA, which unambiguously reject the anthophyte hypothesis, favoring instead a close relationship between Gnetales and conifers. Parsimony- and likelihood-based analyses of plastid rbcL and nuclear 18S rDNA alone and with cox1 and atpA also strongly support a gnetophyte-conifer grouping. Surprisingly, three of four genes (all but nuclear rDNA) and combined three-genome analyses also suggest or strongly support Gnetales as derived conifers, sister to Pinaceae. Analyses with outgroups screened to avoid long branches consistently identify all gymnosperms as a monophyletic sister group to angiosperms. Combined three- and four-gene rooted analyses resolve the branching order for the remaining major groups-cycads separate from other gymnosperms first, followed by Ginkgo and then (Gnetales + Pinaceae) sister to a monophyletic group with all other conifer families. The molecular phylogeny strongly conflicts with current interpretations of seed plant morphology, and implies that many similarities between gnetophytes and angiosperms, such as "flower-like" reproductive structures and double fertilization, were independently derived, whereas other characters could emerge as synapomorphies for an expanded conifer group including Gnetales. An initial angiosperm-gymnosperm split implies a long stem lineage preceding the explosive Mesozoic radiation of flowering plants and suggests that angiosperm origins and homologies should be sought among extinct seed plant groups.

Abstract Workplace stress can be defined as the change in one's physical or mental state in response to workplaces that pose an appraised challenge or threat to that employee. Research has shown that there are a number of factors that contribute to workplace stress. These factors include a toxic work environment, negative workload, isolation, types of hours worked, role conflict, role ambiguity, lack of autonomy, career development barriers, difficult relationships with administrators and/ or coworkers, managerial bullying, harassment, and organizational climate. Should the stressors continue, the employee is at significant risk of developing physiological and psychological disorders that can lead to increased absenteeism, organizational dysfunction, and decreased work productivity. Intervention strategies are discussed to help managers provide support and intervention to employees coping with workplace stress. Key Words: Workplace stressworkplace productivityorganizational behaviorstress

The decomposition of ethylene carbonate (EC) during the initial growth of solid-electrolyte interphase (SEI) films at the solvent-graphitic anode interface is critical to lithium ion battery operations. Ab initio molecular dynamics simulations of explicit liquid EC/graphite interfaces are conducted to study these electrochemical reactions. We show that carbon edge terminations are crucial at this stage, and that achievable experimental conditions can lead to surprisingly fast EC breakdown mechanisms, yielding decomposition products seen in experiments but not previously predicted.

Abstract Aim We investigated the effects of disease on the local abundances and distributions of species at continental scales by examining the impacts of white‐nose syndrome, an infectious disease of hibernating bats, which has recently emerged in N orth A merica. Location N orth A merica and E urope. Methods We used four decades of population counts from 1108 populations to compare the local abundances of bats in N orth A merica before and after the emergence of white‐nose syndrome to the situation in E urope, where the disease is endemic. We also examined the probability of local extinction for six species of hibernating bats in eastern N orth A merica and assessed the influence of winter colony size prior to the emergence of white‐nose syndrome on the risk of local extinction. Results White‐nose syndrome has caused a 10‐fold decrease in the abundance of bats at hibernacula in N orth A merica, eliminating large differences in species abundance patterns that existed between E urope and N orth A merica prior to disease emergence. White‐nose syndrome has also caused extensive local extinctions (up to 69% of sites in a single species). For five out of six species, the risk of local extinction was lower in larger winter populations, as expected from theory, but for the most affected species, the northern long‐eared bat ( M yotis septentrionalis ), extinction risk was constant across winter colony sizes, demonstrating that disease can sometimes eliminate numerical rarity as the dominant driver of extinction risk by driving both small and large populations extinct. Main conclusions Species interactions, including disease, play an underappreciated role in macroecological patterns and influence broad patterns of species abundance, occurrence and extinction.

A phosphorous‐nitrogen intumescent flame‐retardant, 2,2‐diethyl‐1,3‐propanediol phosphoryl melamine (DPPM), was synthesized and characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and nuclear magnetic resonance. Flame‐retardant rigid polyurethane foams (RPUFs) with DPPM (DPPM‐RPUF) as fire‐retardant additive were prepared. Scanning electron microscope (SEM) and mechanical performance testing showed that DPPM exhibited a favorable compatibility with RPUF and negligibly negative influence on the mechanical properties of RPUF. The flame retardancy of DPPM on RPUF was investigated by the limiting oxygen index (LOI), vertical burning test and cone calorimeter. The LOI of DPPM‐RPUF could reach 29.5%, and a UL‐94 V‐0 rating was achieved, when the content of DPPM was 25 php. Furthermore, the DPPM‐RPUF exhibited an outstanding water resistance that it could still obtain a V‐0 rating after water soaking. Thermogravimetric analysis showed that the residual weight of RPUF was relatively low, while the charring ability of DPPM‐RPUF was improved greatly. Real‐time Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy was employed to study the thermo‐oxidative degradation reactions of DPPM‐RPUF. The results revealed that the flame‐retardancy mechanism of DPPM in RPUF was based on the surface charred layer acting as a physical barrier, which slowed down the decomposition of RPUF and prevented the heat and mass transfer between the gas and the condensed phases.

Assessing the scope and severity of threats is necessary for evaluating impacts on populations to inform conservation planning. Quantitative threat assessment often requires monitoring programs that provide reliable data over relevant spatial and temporal scales, yet such programs can be difficult to justify until there is an apparent stressor. Leveraging efforts of wildlife management agencies to record winter counts of hibernating bats, we collated data for 5 species from over 200 sites across 27 U.S. states and 2 Canadian provinces from 1995 to 2018 to determine the impact of white-nose syndrome (WNS), a deadly disease of hibernating bats. We estimated declines of winter counts of bat colonies at sites where the invasive fungus that causes WNS (Pseudogymnoascus destructans) had been detected to assess the threat impact of WNS. Three species undergoing species status assessment by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (Myotis septentrionalis, Myotis lucifugus, and Perimyotis subflavus) declined by more than 90%, which warrants classifying the severity of the WNS threat as extreme based on criteria used by NatureServe. The scope of the WNS threat as defined by NatureServe criteria was large (36% of Myotis lucifugus range) to pervasive (79% of Myotis septentrionalis range) for these species. Declines for 2 other species (Myotis sodalis and Eptesicus fuscus) were less severe but still qualified as moderate to serious based on NatureServe criteria. Data-sharing across jurisdictions provided a comprehensive evaluation of scope and severity of the threat of WNS and indicated regional differences that can inform response efforts at international, national, and state or provincial jurisdictions. We assessed the threat impact of an emerging infectious disease by uniting monitoring efforts across jurisdictional boundaries and demonstrated the importance of coordinated monitoring programs, such as the North American Bat Monitoring Program (NABat), for data-driven conservation assessments and planning.

How do animals use their habitat? Where do they go and what do they do? These basic questions are key not only to understanding a species’ ecology and evolution, but also for addressing many of the environmental challenges we currently face, including problems posed by invasive species, the spread of zoonotic diseases and declines in wildlife populations due to anthropogenic climate and land-use changes. Monitoring the movements and activities of wild animals can be difficult, especially when the species in question are small, cryptic or move over large areas. In this paper, we describe an Automated Radio-Telemetry System (ARTS) that we designed and built on Barro Colorado Island (BCI), Panama to overcome these challenges. We describe the hardware and software we used to implement the ARTS, and discuss the scientific successes we have had using the system, as well as the logistical challenges we faced in maintaining the system in real-world, rainforest conditions. The ARTS uses automated radio-telemetry receivers mounted on 40-m towers topped with arrays of directional antennas to track the activity and location of radio-collared study animals, 24 h a day, 7 days a week. These receiving units are connected by a wireless network to a server housed in the laboratory on BCI, making these data available in real time to researchers via a web-accessible database. As long as study animals are within the range of the towers, the ARTS system collects data more frequently than typical animal-borne global positioning system collars (∼12 locations/h) with lower accuracy (approximately 50 m) but at much reduced cost per tag (∼10X less expensive). The geographic range of ARTS, like all VHF telemetry, is affected by the size of the radio-tag as well as its position in the forest (e.g. tags in the canopy transmit farther than those on the forest floor). We present a model of signal propagation based on landscape conditions, which quantifies these effects and identifies sources of interference, including weather events and human activity. ARTS has been used to track 374 individual animals from 38 species, including 17 mammal species, 12 birds, 7 reptiles or amphibians, as well as two species of plant seeds. These data elucidate the spatio-temporal dynamics of animal activity and movement at the site and have produced numerous peer-reviewed publications, student theses, magazine articles, educational programs and film documentaries. These data are also relevant to long-term population monitoring and conservation plans. Both the successes and the failures of the ARTS system are applicable to broader sensor network applications and are valuable for advancing sensor network research.

A criterion of k-set contractions for a class of nonlinear operators is established and then used to prove the existence of a solution in LP for the nonlinear integral equation. Results of this paper are generalizations 3,4.

This study was designed to understand which factors influence consumer hesitation or delay in online product purchases. The study examined four groups of variables (i.e., consumer characteristics, contextual factors perceived uncertainty factors, and medium/channel innovation factors) that predict three types of online shopping hesitation (i.e., overall hesitation, shopping cart abandonment, and hesitation at the final payment stage). We found that different sets of delay factors are related to different aspects of online shopping hesitation. The study concludes with suggestion for various delay-reduction devices to help consumers close their online decision hesitation.

Recent years have seen a growing interest in measuring and modeling soil CO 2 efflux, as this flux represents a large component of ecosystem respiration and is a key determinant of ecosystem carbon balance. Process‐based models of soil CO 2 production and efflux, commonly based on soil temperature, are limited by nonlinearities such as the observed diurnal hysteresis between soil CO 2 concentration ([CO 2 ]) and temperature. Here we quantify the degree to which hysteresis between soil [CO 2 ] and soil temperature is controlled by soil water content in a montane conifer forest, and how this nonlinearity impacts estimates of soil CO 2 efflux. A representative model that does not consider hysteresis overestimated soil CO 2 efflux for the entire growing season by 19%. At high levels of soil water content, hysteresis imposes organized, daily variability in the relationship between soil [CO 2 ] and soil temperature, and at low levels of soil water content, hysteresis is minimized.

We document the fire history and associated ecological changes of an old-growth forest stand in western Maryland, U.S.A. The study area is located on the side slopes of a ridge system (Savage Mountain). Twenty basal cross sections were obtained from old trees cut in 1986, which provided evidence of 42 fires from 1615 to 1958. Nine fires were recorded in the sample trees in the 17th century, 13 in the 18th century, 12 in the 19th century, and eight in the early to mid-20th century. However, there were no major fire years after 1930. The Weibull modal fire interval was 7.6 years. Oaks recruited consistently from the early 1600s to the early 1900s, but there was increased Acer rubrum L. and Betula lenta L. recruitment with fire suppression after 1930. Species recruitment patterns and long-term fire history reported in this study offer important direct support for the hypothesis that periodic fire played an important role in the historical development and perpetuation of oak forests of the mid-Atlantic region before and after European settlement.

This study is a cross-cultural examination of interactivity on U.S., U.K., Japanese, and South Korean corporate Web sites. Each Web site was content-analyzed for use of various interactivity functions. Using cultural difference criteria of high versus low context, power distance, and individualism-collectivism, this study compares three dimensions of interactivity on the Web sites of each country's top 50 advertisers. Twenty-five interactivity functions/indicators, classified into three interactivity dimensions, were used in the final data analysis to test three research hypotheses. Our findings indicate that Western Web sites tend to emphasize consumer-message (H1) and consumer-marketer interactivity (H2), whereas Eastern Web sites highlight consumer-consumer interactivity (H3). Implications of the findings and suggestions for future research are discussed.

Internet of Things (IoT) provides a generic infrastructure for different applications to integrate information communication techniques with physical components to achieve automatic data collection, transmission, exchange, and computation. The smart grid, as one of typical applications supported by IoT, denoted as a re-engineering and a modernization of the traditional power grid, aims to provide reliable, secure, and efficient energy transmission and distribution to consumers. How to effectively integrate distributed (renewable) energy resources and storage devices to satisfy the energy service requirements of users, while minimizing the power generation and transmission cost, remains a highly pressing challenge in the smart grid. To address this challenge and assess the effectiveness of integrating distributed energy resources and storage devices, in this paper we develop a theoretical framework to model and analyze three types of power grid systems: the power grid with only bulk energy generators, the power grid with distributed energy resources, and the power grid with both distributed energy resources and storage devices. Based on the metrics of the power cumulative cost and the service reliability to users, we formally model and analyze the impact of integrating distributed energy resources and storage devices in the power grid. We also use the concept of network calculus, which has been traditionally used for carrying out traffic engineering in computer networks, to derive the bounds of both power supply and user demand to achieve a high service reliability to users. Through an extensive performance evaluation, our data shows that integrating distributed energy resources conjointly with energy storage devices can reduce generation costs, smooth the curve of bulk power generation over time, reduce bulk power generation and power distribution losses, and provide a sustainable service reliability to users in the power grid.

ABSTRACT Insectivorous bats are integral components of terrestrial ecosystems. Despite this, a growing number of factors causing world‐wide declines in bat populations have been identified. Relatively abundant species are important for bat conservation because of their role in ecosystems and the research opportunities they offer. In addition, species that have been well‐studied present unique opportunities to synthesize information and highlight important areas of focus for conservation and research. This paper focuses on a well‐studied abundant bat, Eptesicus fuscus . I review the relevant literature on habitat use, diet and roost selection by E. fuscus in North America, and highlight important areas of conservation and research for this species, including the effects of roost disturbance, control of economically important insect pests, exposure to pesticides, long‐term monitoring of populations, and the potential consequences of expanding populations. These issues have broad implications for other species and can be used to focus future research and conservation efforts.

Developing bifunctional electrocatalysts for oxygen evolution reaction (OER) and hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) toward overall water splitting with high efficiency and robust durability is highly desirable but very challenging. Herein, we report a highly efficient and robust bifunctional electrocatalyst for overall water splitting based on Co@Ir core–shell nanoparticles encapsulated in nitrogen-doped porous carbon derived from metal–organic frameworks. The series of Co@Ir/NC-x samples were prepared through a galvanic replacement of IrCl3 with Co/NC, which was obtained by calcination of zeolitic imidazolate framework 67 (ZIF-67). In the electrocatalytic characterizations toward OER and HER, Co@Ir/NC-10% exhibited the best performance among the series, with an overpotential of 280 mV at a current density of 10 mA cm–2 for OER, superior to the benchmark IrO2 catalyst, and an overpotential of −121 mV at a current density of 10 mA cm–2 for HER in 1 M KOH. Moreover, Co@Ir/NC-10% also demonstrated markedly higher long-term stability than IrO2 for OER and superior long-term durability than Pt/C for HER. Finally, the overall water splitting catalyzed by the series of composites was explored and visually observed.

This study explored the extent to which preschool children's name writing representations reflected their more general emergent literacy knowledge in print and phonological awareness. As part of a preschool literacy screening program, 3,546 4-year-old children were administered a name writing task and additional indices of emergent literacy. Children were placed into four groups based on the level of their name-writing representations. The four groups were compared for performance on alphabet knowledge, concept of word, print knowledge, rhyme awareness, and beginning sound awareness tasks. The four name-writing groups significantly differed from one another on each of these dependent measures. Additionally, a regression analysis showed the linear combination of the five emergent literacy indices to significantly predict level of name writing representation, accounting for 36% of the variance in outcome. Print-related skills (alphabet knowledge, print concepts), in addition to age, accounted for 34% of this variance. While findings suggest that name writing representations can differentiate children in both phonological and print awareness, name writing representations appear to predominantly reflect print-related knowledge.

Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) is becoming ubiquitous with a proliferation of smart medical devices and applications used in smart hospitals, smart-home based care, and nursing homes. It utilizes smart medical devices and cloud computing services along with core Internet of Things (IoT) technologies to sense patients' vital body parameters, monitor health conditions and generate multivariate data to support just-in-time health services. Mostly, this large amount of data is analyzed in centralized servers. Anomaly Detection (AD) in a centralized healthcare ecosystem is often plagued by significant delays in response time with high performance overhead. Moreover, there are inherent privacy issues associated with sending patients' personal health data to a centralized server, which may also introduce several security threats to the AD model, such as possibility of data poisoning. To overcome these issues with centralized AD models, here we propose a Federated Learning (FL) based AD model which utilizes edge cloudlets to run AD models locally without sharing patients' data. Since existing FL approaches perform aggregation on a single server which restricts the scope of FL, in this paper, we introduce a hierarchical FL that allows aggregation at different levels enabling multi-party collaboration. We introduce a novel disease-based grouping mechanism where different AD models are grouped based on specific types of diseases. Furthermore, we develop a new Federated Time Distributed (FEDTIMEDIS) Long Short-Term Memory (LSTM) approach to train the AD model. We present a Remote Patient Monitoring (RPM) use case to demonstrate our model, and illustrate a proof-of-concept implementation using Digital Twin (DT) and edge cloudlets.

The temporal and spatial expression of tomato wound- and defense-response genes to Bemisia tabaci biotype B (the silverleaf whitefly) and Trialeurodes vaporariorum (the greenhouse whitefly) feeding were characterized. Both species of whiteflies evoked similar changes in tomato gene expression. The levels of RNAs for the methyl jasmonic acid (MeJA)- or ethylene-regulated genes that encode the basic β-1,3-glucanase (GluB), basic chitinase (Chi9), and Pathogenesis-related protein-1 (PR-1) were monitored. GluB and Chi9 RNAs were abundant in infested leaves from the time nymphs initiated feeding (day 5). In addition, GluB RNAs accumulated in apical non-infested leaves. PR-1 RNAs also accumulated after whitefly feeding. In contrast, the ethylene- and salicylic acid (SA)-regulated Chi3 and PR-4 genes had RNAs that accumulated at low levels and GluAC RNAs that were undetectable in whitefly-infested tomato leaves. The changes in Phenylalanine ammonia lyase5 (PAL5) were variable; in some, but not all infestations, PAL5 RNAs increased in response to whitefly feeding. PAL5 RNA levels increased in response to MeJA, ethylene, and abscisic acid, and declined in response to SA. Transcripts from the wound-response genes, leucine aminopeptidase (LapA1) and proteinase inhibitor 2 (pin2), were not detected following whitefly feeding. Furthermore, whitefly infestation of transgenic LapA1:GUS tomato plants showed that whitefly feeding did not activate the LapA1 promoter, although crushing of the leaf lamina increased GUS activity up to 40 fold. These studies indicate that tomato plants perceive B. tabaci and T. vaporariorum in a manner similar to baterical pathogens and distinct from tissue-damaging insects.

We conducted 2 field experiments to assess relative importance of acorn-embryo excision in the caching decisions of small mammals. In the 1st, we selectively provisioned small mammals with metal-tagged acorns of red oak (Quercus rubra) and white oak (Q. alba) at 40 point locations in 8 sites in an oak forest in northeastern Pennsylvania. We then followed the fate of cached seeds by relocating acorns with metal detectors soon after they were cached and again in spring after seeds began to germinate. At least 1 species of small mammal excised embryos of 70% of the cached acorns of white oak and 4% of those of red oak. Animals also were observed to revisit caches in spring and excise embryos of germinating acorns. More excised acorns of white oak were found intact in spring than those of red oak, indicating that the behavior is important for long-term storage of these seeds. In a 2nd experiment, we presented free-ranging Mexican gray squirrels (Sciurus aureogaster) with pairs of acorns of 5 native white oak and 5 native red oak species and recorded caching events and whether or not cached seeds had their embryos removed. Squirrels cached significantly more acorns of white oak species, frequently excised embryos of these seeds, and only excised embryos of red oaks when they were germinating. These results support our previous hypothesis that the behavior of embryo excision is geographically widespread and has important implications for cache-management strategies of some diurnal tree squirrels and their effect on dispersal of oaks.