Potential contamination from hazardous and solid waste landfills stemming from population increase, rapid industrialization, and the proliferation of assembly plants known as the maquiladoras, are of major concern in the U.S.-Mexican border area. Additionally, historical, current, and future stresses on the Hueco Bolson alluvial aquifer in the El Paso/Ciudad Juarez area due to excessive groundwater withdrawal can affect contaminant migration in the area. In the current study, an updated and improved threedimensional numerical groundwater flow and transport model is developed using a current Hueco Bolson groundwater availability model as its basis. The model with contaminant transport is required to access and characterize the extent of vulnerability of the aquifer to potential contamination from landfills in the El Paso/Ciudad Juarez border area. The model developed in this study is very capable of serving as the basis of future studies for water availability, water quality, and contamination assessments in the Hueco Bolson. The implementation of fate and transport modeling and the incorporation of the Visual MODFLOW® pre and post processor, requiring MODFLOW 2000 data conversion, enabled significant enhancements to the numerical modeling and computing capabilities for the Hueco Bolson. The model in the current research was also developed by employing MT3DMS©, ZONEBUDGET, and Visual PEST® for automated calibrations. Simulation results found that the Hueco Bolson released more water from storage than the aquifer was being recharged in response to increased pumping to supply the growing border area population. Hence, significant head drops and high levels of drawdown were observed in the El Paso/Ciudad Juarez area. Predictive simulations were completed representing scenarios of potential contamination from the border area sites. Fate and transport results were most sensitive to hydraulic conductivities, flow velocities, and directions at the sites. Sites that were located within the vicinity of the El Paso Valley and the Rio Grande River, where head differences and permeabilities were significant, exhibited the highest potentials for contaminant migration.

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x, 144 p. ： col. ill. / Together, the cities El Paso, Texas and Juarez, Mexico form the largest international border metropolis in the world. While El Paso consistently ranks among the safest cities in the U.S., Cd. Juarez's recent and extreme escalation of violence has produced one of the world's most dangerous locales. Within this starkly differentiated and transnational urban conglomeration, complex geographies of gender, culture, and identity have emerged, prompting the following question: how is mobility shifting throughout el Paso del Norte in response to the heightened violence in Juarez, and what are the implications of these negotiations of mobility for fronterizo (borderlander) identity? By focusing on gendered mobilities in the U.S./Mexico borderlands, this study engages with cultural implications of the recent drug conflict fueled exodus from Juarez into El Paso, articulating the negotiation of identities and daily geographies which characterize the divided lives of borderlanders. / Committee in charge: Lise Nelson， Chairperson； Alexander Murphy， Member； Kathryn Meehan， Member

This thesis seeks to promote a clearer understanding of relationships between trade liberalization and environmental quality in a free trade zone along an international border, between countries unevenly matched in development and infrastructure. Specifically, it examines whether theories of environmental degradation provide appropriate models for explaining the impact of NAFTA on the environment in the Paso del Norte. The relationship between trade liberalization and environmental quality is examined through an analysis of environmental indicators in the decade preceding and following NAFTA. Finally, the role of environmental governance is addressed, especially the intricacies involved in multi-jurisdictional governance of the environment. The research indicates that trade liberalization is not necessarily environmentally harmful. The data suggest that NAFTA had little to no direct negative impact on the region's environmental condition, but they also do not provide evidence that NAFTA improved the environment. One factor that could have helped to limit its effects may be local, interstate, and international initiatives that improved the health of the ecosystem along the border before NAFTA was even conceived. Another factor is the environmental governance in place before and after NAFTA. Thus, it may be beneficial for trade liberalization agreements to address environmental concerns as integral parts of the negotiations, and to set requirements for meeting infrastructure demands, as the agreements are implemented. Furthermore, it is important that international environmental institutions established to monitor environmental cooperation be more closely associated with the trade cooperation organizations and be given the authority needed to complete their directives more effectively. / Master of Arts

Para el logro de un desarrollo sano es de vital importancia contar con un equilibrio económico en los diferentes rubros de la actividad productiva de las ciudades hermanas (CJS- ELP) y no sólo concretarse al ámbito de la 'maquila'. Si bien el turismo como una opción es viable, su incorporación como forma activa para otras regiones económicas del mismo estado no se ha presentado, de manera que la búsqueda de alternativas para atraer visitantes es aún un desafío para la actividad turística de Juárez-El Paso. La interrogante para los inversionistas y el gobierno es cómo encaminar los esfuerzos en la actividad turística que permitan un crecimiento armónico en la región binacional.La nvestigación, plantea valorar el fenómeno del turismo transfronterizo y se acomete una aproximación de las condiciones reticulares de los actores- stakeholders del turismo de la actividad turística en la frontera México - Estados Unidos bajo un entorno de inseguridad, mediante el análisis del caso de las ciudades hermanas de Ciudad Juárez - El Paso. Los objetivos específicos del examen reticular permiten concebir una relación entre la conformación de redes dinámicas en un espacio territorial fronterizo con potencialidades de alianzas, colaboración y cooperación en un destino binacional. / To achieve healthy development is essential to have an economic balance in the different areas of productive activity in the sister cities (CJS-ELP) and not only realized the scope of the 'maquila'. While tourism is a viable option, its incorporation as a proactive manner to other economic regions of the state has not been submitted, so that the search for alternatives to attract visitors is still a challenge for tourism in Juarez - El Paso. The question for investors and the government is how to direct efforts in tourism to allow balanced growth in the binational region. The research raises assess the phenomenon of cross-border tourism and begin an approximation of the reticular conditions of the actors- stakeholders in tourism in the Mexico - United States under a climate of insecurity, by analyzing the case of sister cities of Ciudad Juárez - El Paso. The specific objectives of the reticular review design allow a relationship between the formation of dynamic networks in a territorial area bordering potential partnerships, collaboration and cooperation in a bi-national destiny.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, School of Public Health, 2007. / "May 2007" Includes bibliographical references (leaves 181-192).

Thesis (D. Min.)--Erskine Theological Seminary, 2008. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 131-134).

Thesis (D. Min.)--Erskine Theological Seminary, 2008. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 131-134).

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship among different levels of acculturation on the childbearing beliefs and practices of pregnant Mexican American adolescents living in Southwest border regions. A descriptive correlational design was used in this study. Three instruments were used to collect data. A total of 73 pregnant Mexican American adolescents participated in the study. The Laredo sample and the Tucson sample were identified as true bicultural samples. The El Paso group was identified as a Mexican-oriented bicultural sample. All geographical areas had an equal acceptance of traditional Mexican medicine and biomedical beliefs. Laredo and Tucson adolesents' beliefs in the traditional Mexican childbearing culture was directly related to their acculturation level. For the El Paso group, there was a low negative correlation which indicated that being more or less acculturated did not necessarily affect the adolescents' beliefs in the traditional Mexican childbearing culture.

It has been said that watersheds and aquifers ignore political boundaries. This phenomenon is often the reason for extensive regulation of surface -water and ground -water resources which are shared by two or more political entities. Regulation is often the result of years of litigation over who really owns the water, how much is owned, and how much is available for future use. Groundwater models are sometimes used as quantitative tools which aid in the decision making process regarding appropriation and regulation of these scarce, shared, water resources. The following few paragraphs detail the occurrences in the Lower Rio Grande Basin which led to the current ground -water modeling effort. New Mexico, Texas and Mexico have wrestled forever over the rights to the Lower Rio Grande and the aquifers of the Rio Grande Basin (Figure 1). As early as 1867, due to a flood event on the Rio Grande, Texas and Mexico were disputing the new border created by the migrating Rio Grande. During the 1890's, the users upstream from the Mesilla and El Paso Valleys were diverting and applying so much of the Rio Grande that the Mesilla and El Paso valley farmers litigated in order to apportion and guarantee the supply. In the recent past, disputes over who may use the ground -water resources of the region and the effect of surface- water uses on aquifer water levels resulted in litigation between El Paso, Texas, and New Mexico.