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This study examines the relationship between transportation infrastructure and social well-being in the United States South, especially in the Black Belt. Specifically, this study focuses on the impact of airport accessibility and improvements on social well-being within the community capital framework in which built capital and political capital acted as a foundational basis for the broader concept of positive community capital. The results indicated that many cumulative disadvantages exist in the Black Belt of the southern United States. The research found that a higher level of airport accessibility is associated with a lower level of poverty and higher levels of health outcomes and net migration. The research further found that having a college and university in a community is associated with higher high school graduation rates, lower poverty rates, and lower unemployment rates. This research has important implications for addressing the cumulative disadvantages and isolation in the Black Belt.

This research presents the results of a bee survey (Hymenoptera: Apoidea) in remnants of the Mississippi Black Belt Prairie, a unique physiographical region that is a threatened community covering 14,141 square kilometers in both Mississippi and Alabama. Sampling was performed with sweep nets and Malaise traps. A total of 151 visits were made to several prairie remnant areas during the years 1999 – 2001 with 92 Malaise trap samples. Historical bee collection data from these prairies were incorporated into this survey. A total of 6,140 specimens resulting in 107 species, 51 new state records and eight disjunct species were collected within five bee families: Colletidae, Andrenidae, Halictidae, Megachilidae and Apidae. The most abundant species belonged to the Halictidae. The most common floral families visited were Asteraceae and Fabaceae. The addition of the species in this survey brings the state list of bees to at least 204.

Thesis(M.S.)--Auburn University, 2005. / Abstract. Vita. Includes bibliographic references.

Lean Six Sigma is one of the tools organizations use to help their processes run faster and thus maximize their profits. It is a thorough approach that can reveal defects in companies' processes through examining customers' needs and its statistical data Its popularity spreads fast from the early adopters such as General Electric, Toyota or Motorola and many companies are keen to get their hands on it and achieve similar success as above mentioned. Czech companies are not different. There is, however, a tendency to lay it aside based on first time impressions. The most frequent reasons are: complexity, need to make dramatic changes in the company's culture and high initial costs. Main goal of this thesis is to show that Lean Six Sigma does not necessarily have to be a thorough approach. It can also be used as a one-time tool to improve company's processes, just by picking the right parts and combining them in the right order. This thesis describes the most useful tools and also shows how they can be used in the real situation. By aligning them in a row it also creates a framework for Lean Six Sigma implementation projects which can be used repeatedly. One chapter also describes various problems that might occur during the implementation and provides readers with possible solutions to overcome them.

Thesis (M.S.)--Auburn University, 2007. / Abstract. Includes bibliographic references (ℓ. 70-71)

Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / The systemic racism imposed on the lives and education aspiration of six of my elders who stayed in the racist South during the ferociously deleterious era of Jim Crow is the focus of this phenomenological critical race study. These stories centered the voices of my elders as powerful weapons to expose white supremacy and the psychophysiological trauma imposed upon my elders. These stories were about the lives, lived experiences, and educational trials and triumphs of six of my Brown and Black hue American elders whose ancestry was born out of slavery and delivered into the vicious Jim Crow era. My work was grounded in Phenomenological Critical Race Theory. Critical Race Theory validates my elders’ narratives and their narratives fortify the tenets of CRT. For you see, racism was an everyday phenomenon my elders experienced as residents of rural Southern America. My elders came to understand “what” they were, Black, by understanding “who” they were not, White. Furthermore, this qualitative phenomenological critical race study was guided by three inquiries, what experiences have you had with Jim Crow; how or in what ways did your experiences with Jim Crow affect your education; and how or in what ways did your experience with Jim Crow affect your life? These inquiries produced four intersecting themes, 1) the survival of racism as part of everyday life, 2) economic exploitation of Black labor, 3) denial of equitable education, and 4) the sociopolitical construction of racial identity, and three significant findings, racist place, sociopolitical oppression, and inequitable education.

Reports of declining insect populations suggest that more research focusing on this phenomenon is needed, especially in pollinator insects. Climate change, habitat destruction, and usage of certain pesticides have all been implicated in insect decline. Neonicotinoid pesticides are highly toxic to bees, can have drastic sub-lethal effects on behavior, and are persistent in the environment; likewise, they have been implicated as a major factor affecting bee populations. However, there are limited studies on native bees regarding their interactions with neonicotinoids, even regarding simple questions such as exposure levels. In this study, we aimed to assess concentrations of common neonicotinoids in native bees and soils from a threatened habitat in our region, the Black Belt Prairie, by using a modified QuEChERS LC/MS-MS protocol. Our results showed that specific taxa of native bees- Bombus spp., Xylocopa spp., and Mellissodes spp. (Family: Apidae)- were exposed to neonicotinoids. In contrast, no concentration of neonicotinoids was detected in our soil samples.

The relationship of ant community composition to various habitat characteristics is compared across four habitat types and 12 environmental variables in Mississippi. The four habitat types include pasture, prairie, and oak-hickory forests in the Black Belt and forests in the Flatwoods physiographic region. Ants were sampled using pitfall traps, litter sampling, baiting and hand collecting. A total of 20,916 ants representing 68 species were collected. NMS and ANCOVA both revealed three distinct ant communities (pasture, prairie, and ?forests?) based on species composition and mean ant abundance per habitat type between the four habitat types. Principal component analysis (PCA) partitioned the 12 environmental variation into four axes with eigenvalues >1. Axis 1 differentiated open grass-dominated habitats from woodlands. In contrast axis two mainly separated pastures from prairie remnants. Multiple regression models using the four significant PCA axes revealed that total species richness was significantly affected by variation in the first two PCA axes. Forested sites supported approximately nine more species of ants than prairies and 21 more than pastures. Comparisons of the abundance of ant functional groups were also made between the four habitat types with multiple regression models to investigate how the environmental variables affected certain groups of ants. Annotated notes are included for each ant species encountered during this study.

Orientador: Antonio Batocchio / Dissertação (mestrado profissional) - Universidade Estadual de Campinas, Faculdade de Engenharia Mecanica / Made available in DSpace on 2018-08-05T20:01:02Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 Scatolin_AndreCelso_M.pdf: 1108284 bytes, checksum: 1834481388729e17c9e3a8744641a821 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2005 / Resumo: Este trabalho tem o objetivo de mostrar a eficiência da aplicação da metodologia Seis Sigma para a redução das perdas num processo de manufatura. O processo de fabricação de respiradores descartáveis foi escolhido para o estudo de caso porque gerava uma enorme quantidade de perda das fibras utilizadas como matéria-prima. As metodologias de melhorias até então aplicadas tinham reduzido significativamente o nível das perdas, porém se fazia necessária uma abordagem diferente para se reduzir ainda mais. Seguindo a metodologia Seis Sigma, uma equipe foi formada para focar a atenção na redução destas perdas e quebrar o paradigma que não se pode eliminar as perdas inerentes de um processo. Através da adição de uma fase de desfibramento da perda ¿ fibra prensada que era descartada ao final do processo ¿ recuperou-se toda esta fibra, deixando-a com características semelhantes à fibra virgem. Portanto, as perdas foram 100% eliminadas. O nível sigma, que era historicamente menor que 3, passou para maior que 6 ao final do trabalho. A aplicação de ferramentas estatísticas demonstrou qual o ponto otimizado da mistura de fibras virgens e fibras recuperadas, para que as propriedades finais do produto não sofressem alterações significativas sob o ponto de vista do usuário final. Este trabalho gerou um desenvolvimento técnico da equipe envolvida e preciosa economia de recurso não renovável / Abstract: This work aims to show the efficiency of Six Sigma Methodology application in reducing waste of a manufacturing process. The making process of disposable respirator was chosen to this case study because it generated an enormous amount of fiber scrap used as raw material. Improving methodologies applied every since had reduced significantly the waste level but a different approach was needed to reduce it even more. Following the Six Sigma Methodology, a team was formed to focus the whole attention on reducing this waste and breaking the paradigm which inherent waste of a process cannot be eliminated. Through an addition of a new process step in order to reprocess the waste ¿ pressed fiber discharged by the end of this process - all of it was recovered, keeping the same characteristics of raw fiber. Therefore, the waste was 100% eliminated. Sigma level, which was historically lower than 3, became higher than 6 by the end of the work. The statistics tools applied demonstrated the optimized set point of the raw and recovered fiber mixture in order to maintain the final product properties under the point of view of end-users. This work resulted in team technical development and precious non-renewed raw material savings / Mestrado / Planejamento e Gestão Estrategica da Manufatura / Mestre em Engenharia Mecânica