The present research examined the effects that the variables of burial depth and presence of a plastic covering material had on the decomposition rate of fetal remains. The experimental sample consisted of fetal pigs (Sus scrofa) as a substitute for fetal human remains. The general size and bone composition of fetal pigs are comparable to those of fetal humans. The decomposition of the fetal pigs remains was observed in four independent variable groups: 20 cm unwrapped, 20 cm wrapped, 60 cm unwrapped, and 60 cm wrapped, per time period. The author hypothesized that the rate of decay would be slower for wrapped remains or for remains at a greater burial depth. The results of the two different burial depths and of the wrapped versus unwrapped groups was analyzed to determine the effects of those variables on the rate of decomposition. Analysis of these remains consisted of quantitative data, including pre-burial and post-burial mass comparison as well as the Total Body Score. It was found that wrapping was a significant influencer of mass loss with a p value of 0.0298 but not for the Total Body Score with a p value of 0.17565, while burial depth did not have a significant effect on either mass loss nor Total Body Score with a p value of 0.1956 and 0.08969, respectively.

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No description available.

A musical score prepared in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Music degree.

A musical score prepared in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Master of Music degree. The work was begun in September of 1951, and was completed in April of 1962. It is cast in three movements: fast, fugal style; slow, a variation-rondo; fast, sonata form. A closely knit structure is achieved through melodic and rhythmic relationships throughout. Thus, the second theme of the last movement is derived from the opening theme of the first movement; subsidiary material from movement one appears again as developmental material in movement two; the first phrase of the opening these in movement one is employed developmentally in the third movement.

The reporting of scores on educational tests is at times misunderstood, misinterpreted, and potentially confusing to examinees and other stakeholders who may need to interpret test scores. In reporting test results to examinees, there is a need for clarity in the message communicated. As pressure rises for students to demonstrate performance at a certain level, the communication of scores to the public needs to be examined. Although public school student testing often is placed in the spotlight, this study examines score reporting in teacher certification, which may not have the same complexities of student test score reporting, but does have the equally critical need to effectively communicate scoring information. The purpose of this study was to create multiple teacher certification examinee score reports based on findings in the literature on educational test score reporting, as well as marketing and design principles, and to conduct interviews and focus groups to gather feedback on the comprehension and preferences in interpreting the designed score reports and results. Different approaches for reporting test scores were used to design the score reporting materials for a hypothetical teacher certification testing examinee who had not passed. Educators and educational testing professionals were convened and interviewed to review the score reports and offer feedback, suggestions and discussion. The findings are covered in great detail. Using the findings, a final model score report was designed, which was then reviewed with doctoral students in educational measurement. Through this process, some clear patterns and differences arose. Overall, there was a desire on the educator and doctoral student end to provide as much information as possible, where supported by sound measurement principles. The reporting of raw performance information, as well as accommodating comprehension styles by providing performance information in contextual, statistical and visual ways were requested. Upon addressing these requests, two areas that may not have full clarity and direction remained: The process of converting raw score performance to a scaled score (participants wanted more information on this process), and information provided that could address candidate weak areas, directing examinees to materials that could improve their studies, understanding, and examination performance.

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The silhouette score is a widely used technique to evaluate the quality of a clustering result. One of the current issues with the silhouette score is its sensitivity to outliers, which can lead to misleading interpretations. This problem is caused by the silhouette score using the arithmetic mean to calculate the average intra and inter-cluster distances. To address this issue, three modified silhouette scores are presented: GenSil, TrimSil, and extended TrimSil, which replace the arithmetic mean with the generalized mean, the trimmed mean and a modified trimmed mean, respectively. Experiments on both simulated and real-world datasets show that GenSil is the most effective method, significantly reducing the impact of outliers and achieving high silhouette scores with negative parameter values. TrimSil also improves silhouette scores but performs worse than GenSil, while the extended TrimSil outperforms TrimSil but is still less effective than GenSil. To further aid in selecting the optimal number of clusters with these modified silhouette scores, a more straightforward visualization technique, the silhouette-parameter plot, is also introduced. / Thesis / Master of Science (MSc)

Obesity is a major risk factor for multiple common chronic diseases. The prevalence in European countries is high and a significant public health concern. This thesis aims to explore the obesity landscape in the Cooperative Health Research in South Tyrol (CHRIS) study. The first step was to characterise the obese CHRIS population, taking into account the established body mass index (BMI) classification from the World Health Organization (WHO) and looking at metabolically healthy and unhealthy obesity. We investigated the familial aggregation of these traits. We identified several families with significant familial aggregation and observed varying degrees of overlap for these traits in different families. The focus was then on implementing and applying a Genome-Wide Polygenic Score for obese participants. These scores were computed for individuals based on the presence of different genetic variants weighted according to their measured effects in genome-wide association studies (GWAS). We then paid attention to the targeted metabolomics data of the CHRIS study, to identify different serum metabolites associated with metabolically healthy/unhealthy obesity, using logistic regression and random forest methods to explore metabolic signatures to distinguish obesity into metabolically healthy and metabolically unhealthy obesity. Several biomarkers were shown to be related to obesity, many of which confirmed by existing evidence (such as BCAAs, tyrosine, and lysophosphatidylcholines).

No description available.