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- Creators: Arizona State University
- Status: Published
Description
Titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanomaterial use is becoming more prevalent as is the likelihood of human exposure and environmental release. The goal of this thesis is to develop analytical techniques to quantify the level of TiO2 in complex matrices to support environmental, health, and safety research of TiO2 nanomaterials. A pharmacokinetic model showed that the inhalation of TiO2 nanomaterials caused the highest amount to be absorbed and distributed throughout the body. Smaller nanomaterials (< 5nm) accumulated in the kidneys before clearance. Nanoparticles of 25 nm diameter accumulated in the liver and spleen and were cleared from the body slower than smaller nanomaterials. A digestion method using nitric acid, hydrofluoric acid, and hydrogen peroxide was found to digest organic materials and TiO2 with a recovery of >80%. The samples were measured by inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) and the method detection limit was 600 ng of Ti. An intratracheal instillation study of TiO2 nanomaterials in rats found anatase TiO2 nanoparticles in the caudal lung lobe of rats 1 day post instillation at a concentration of 1.2 ug/mg dry tissue, the highest deposition rate of any TiO2 nanomaterial. For all TiO2 nanomaterial morphologies the concentrations in the caudal lobes were significantly higher than those in the cranial lobes. In a study of TiO2 concentration in food products, white colored foods or foods with a hard outer shell had higher concentrations of TiO2. Hostess Powdered Donettes were found to have the highest Ti mass per serving with 200 mg Ti. As much as 3.8% of the total TiO2 mass was able to pass through a 0.45 um indicating that some of the TiO2 is likely nanosized. In a study of TiO2 concentrations in personal care products and paints, the concentration of TiO2 was as high as 117 ug/mg in Benjamin Moore white paint and 70 ug/mg in a Neutrogena sunscreen. Greater than 6% of Ti in one sunscreen was able to pass through a 0.45 um filter. The nanosized TiO2 in food products and personal care products may release as much as 16 mg of nanosized TiO2 per individual per day to wastewater.
ContributorsWeir, Alex Alan (Author) / Westerhoff, Paul K (Thesis advisor) / Hristovski, Kiril (Committee member) / Herckes, Pierre (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
Since its launch by the US Green Building Council (USGBC), Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification has been postured as the "gold standard" for environmentally conscious, sustainable building design, construction and operations. However, as a "living measurement", one which requires ongoing evaluation and reporting of attainment and compliance with LEED certification requirements, there is none. Once awarded, LEED certification does not have a required reporting component to effectively track continued adherence to LEED standards. In addition, there is no expiry tied to the certification; once obtained, a LEED certification rating is presumed to be a valid representation of project certification status. Therefore, LEED lacks a requirement to demonstrate environmental impact of construction materials and building systems over the entire life of the project. Consequently, LEED certification is merely a label rather than a true representation of ongoing adherence to program performance requirements over time. Without continued monitoring and reporting of building design and construction features, and in the absence of recertification requirements, LEED is, in reality, a gold star rather than a gold standard. This thesis examines the lack of required ongoing monitoring, reporting, or recertification requirements following the award by the USGBC of LEED certification; compares LEED with other international programs which do have ongoing reporting or recertification requirements; demonstrates the need and benefit of ongoing reporting or recertification requirements; and explores possible methods for implementation of mandatory reporting requirements within the program.
ContributorsCarpenter, Anne Therese (Author) / Olson, Larry (Thesis advisor) / Hild, Nicholas (Committee member) / Brown, Albert (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2013
Description
The handling of waste encompasses the following processes: recycling, collection, treatment, and disposal. It is crucial to provide a cost-effective waste management system that improves public health and reduces environmental risks. In developing countries, proper handling of solid and hazardous wastes remain severely limited in urban cities if the industries and hospitals producing it do not take responsibility. Recycling and reusing of 12% of total waste in Phnom Penh is an active industry in Cambodia, driven by an informal network of waste pickers, collectors, and buyers. This thesis examines the environmental situation of solid and hazardous wastes in Phnom Penh. The socio-economic background of waste pickers and their current practices for handling solid and hazardous wastes will be mainly discussed in order to understand health and sanitation impacts and risks for disposal of solid and hazardous waste by these informal waste pickers. Surveys and interviews with the following sources are conducted: waste pickers, community members, observation at local dumpsites, governmental officials, and other non-government organization agencies in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. This thesis reports the external and internal factors that hinder safety and cost-effective management for disposal of solid and hazardous wastes. Multiple literature reviews are assessed in regards to the health effects, economic, and social impacts in developing countries. Evidentially, after attending several training and environmental awareness-raising programs, waste pickers expressed concerns about their health and the environment. Instead of receiving support, waste pickers are under economic pressure to use improper tools for waste picking, to stop working, get access to health care/service, to change their career, and prevent contact to limit serious communicable diseases and disability. As a result, the government and other related government agencies have made an effort to establish sanitation handling, treatment, and disposal systems by closing the old dumpsite. Due to limited entrepreneurship and business experience after training, most waste pickers cannot initiate micro business or find new jobs and then resume their waste picking. In conclusion, this thesis proposed that there are alternative technologies and management methods that will allow waste pickers to maintain employment while minimizing hazardous waste. Some examples of alternatives for waste pickers are establishing a material recovery center and alternative higher income occupation.
ContributorsChhun, Gina (Author) / Parmentier, Mary (Thesis advisor) / Grossman, Gary (Committee member) / Maneepong, Chuthatip (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
In the United States, some 94 million people (29% of the US population) live in areas immediately adjacent to a coast. The global phenomenon of climate-induced environmental change is largely framed as a one-way cause-and-effect relationship, where individuals, communities, and populations inhabiting at-risk locations are either forced to relocate or do so of their own accord. Yet residents of such at-risk areas are increasingly actively choosing to remain, even as risk intensifies. Using a mixed-methods approach, this dissertation examines environmental perceptions, the internalization of risk, the influence of information sources, and how individuals residing in coastal locations process their migration decisions. Established migration and hazard frameworks and theory are poorly positioned to understand the environments’ role in migration decisions. From these perspectives, environmental factors are near exclusively framed as negative affective biophysical push factors. Migration frameworks also fail to adequately incorporate reasons for non-migration. This dissertation directly addresses both these gaps in understanding. This research utilizes data from across the Gulf Coast, with a focus on fieldwork from Terrebonne Parish, Louisiana, and a dataset of 123 surveys and 63 interviews across a diverse group of coastal residents. Residents perceive of their environment in much more robust terms than just the biophysical. A majority of terms incorporated social and cultural aspects of environment, and environmental meaning was expressed across a continuum of proximal (most important/close) to more distal (less important/distant) scales. Little support is found for the traditional idea that economic or natural-environmental factors are more influential in decisions to migrate away from ones’ home. In predicting migration intention, socially and environmentally derived variables improved migration model performance. This dissertation demonstrates that internalization of risk by coastal residents is not a straightforward relationship, but rather one mediated by; social-environmental factors, personal experience, sense of place, and trust, which in turn influences intention to migrate, move locally, or remain in place. Residents perceive of their environment far more broadly than current risk-management planning allows. Results provide coastal residents, as well as community leaders and emergency managers who perceive environment differently, new tools for productive engagement and future policy development within coastal landscapes.
ContributorsTill, Charlotte Emma (Author) / BurnSilver, Shauna (Thesis advisor) / Tsuda, Takeyuki (Committee member) / White, Dave (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022
Description
An Earned Value Management System (EVMS) is an organization’s system for project/program management that integrates a defined set of associated work scopes, schedules and budgets, allowing for effective planning, performance, and management control. A mature EVMS that is compliant with standards and guidelines, and that is applied in a positive social environment is critical to the overall success of large and complex projects and programs. However, a comprehensive and up-to-date literature review revealed a lack of a data-driven and consistent rating system that can gauge the maturity and the environment surrounding EVMS implementation. Therefore, the primary objective of this dissertation focuses on the EVMS maturity and environment, and investigates their impact on project performance. The author was one of the 41 research team members whose goal was to develop the novel rating system called Integrated Project/Program Management (IP2M) Maturity and Environment Total Risk Rating (METRR). Using a multi-method research approach, the rating system was developed based on a literature review of more than 600 references, a survey with 294 responses, focus group meetings, and research charrettes with more than 100 subject matter experts from the industry. Performance data from 35 completed projects and programs representing over $21.8 billion in total cost was collected and analyzed. The data analysis showed that the projects with high EVMS maturity and good EVMS environment outperformed those with low maturity and poor environment in key project performance measures. The contributions of this work includes: (1) developing definitions for EVM, EVMS and other research related terms, (2) determining the gaps in the EVMS literature, (3) determining the EVMS state of the practice in the industry, (4) developing a scalable rating system to measure the EVMS maturity and environment, (5) providing quantified evidence on the impact of EVMS maturity and environment on project performance, and (6) providing guidance to practitioners to gauge their EVMS maturity and environment for an enhanced project and program management integration and performance.
ContributorsAramali, Vartenie Mardiros (Author) / Gibson Jr., George Edward (Thesis advisor) / El Asmar, Mounir (Committee member) / Parrish, Kristen (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2022
Description
Aggressive and violent behavior is expressed differently across development, but for some adolescents, this behavior leads to criminal justice involvement through arrests and incarceration. Further, according to the biopsychosocial model, aggressive behavior is influenced by both genetics and the environment. This study sought to examine the differential impacts of early childhood environmental cumulative risk and genetic risk on the developmental cascade from middle childhood behavioral aggression and lack of control to adolescent antisocial behavior or callous-unemotional traits, to emerging adult involvement with the criminal justice system, and whether the effects of risk were mitigated by receiving the Family Check-Up (FCU) prevention program in childhood. The sample included high-risk youth (N = 731; 50% female, 50% White, 28% Black, 13% Hispanic, 9% Indigenous, Native Hawaiian, or Asian; of these 13% were multiracial; Mincome = $28,993; representative 515 genotyped) involved in a randomized-controlled trial of the Family Check-Up and followed longitudinally across 11 waves from ages 2 through 19 years. Behavioral measures included parent-report of behavioral aggression and observational lack of control in middle childhood, self-report of antisocial behavior and callous-unemotional (CU) traits in adolescence, and self-report of involvement with the legal system at age 19. Results of longitudinal structural equation modeling (SEM) supported a developmental cascade from middle childhood behavioral aggression to antisocial behavior in adolescence to legal system involvement. Early cumulative environmental risk and polygenic risk tolerance (RT PGS) significantly predicted involvement with the legal system at age 19, while RT PGS also predicted antisocial behavior in adolescence. Further, intervention effects were found for the FCU, such that the FCU disrupted the effects of RT PGS and middle childhood aggression on antisocial behavior and CU traits in adolescence. This study showed that the FCU can mitigate polygenic risk, supporting the benefit of early psychosocial prevention programs. Importantly, this study showed initial evidence that prevention programs targeting early childhood conduct problems could potentially reduce rates of justice system involvement, including arrests and incarceration, by the age of 19.
ContributorsOstner, Savannah Grace (Author) / Lemery-Chalfant, Kathryn (Thesis advisor) / Tein, Jenn-Yun (Committee member) / Davis, Mary C (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2024
Description
Public awareness of nature and environmental issues has grown in the last decades and zoos have successfully followed suit by re-branding themselves as key representatives for conservation. However, considering the fast rate of environmental degradation, in the near future, zoos may become the only place left for wildlife. Some scholars argue that we have entered a new epoch titled the “Anthropocene” that postulates the idea that untouched pristine nature is almost nowhere to be found. Many scientists and scholars argue that it is time that we embraced this environmental situation and anticipated the change. Clearly, the impact of urbanization is reaching into the wild, so how can we design for animals in our artificializing world? Using the Manoa School method that argues that every future includes these four, generic, alternatives: growth, discipline, collapse, and transformation , this dissertation explores possible future animal archetypes by considering multiple possibilities of post zoo design.
ContributorsAlshaheen, Rua (Author) / Hejduk, Renata (Thesis advisor) / Allenby, Braden (Committee member) / Finn, Ed (Committee member) / Petrucci, Darren (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2019
Description
These are unprecedented times. Like never before, humans, having separated themselves from the web of life through the skillful use of their opposable thumbs, have invented the means of extinction and have systematized it for the benefit of the few at the expense of all else. Yet humans are also designing fixes and alternatives that will soon overcome the straight line trajectory to ugliness and loss that the current order would lead the rest of humanity through. The works in this dissertation are connected by two themes: (1) those humans who happen to be closely connected to the lands, waters and wildlife, through millennia of adaptation and inventive association, have a great deal to share with the rest, who, through history have become distanced from the lands and waters and wildlife they came from; and (2) as the inheritors of all the insults that the current disrespectful and wasteful system is heaping upon all true sensibilities, young people, who are Indigenous, and who are the critical generation for biocultural survival, have an immense role to play - for their cultures, and for all of the rest. The survivance of autochthonous culture through intergenerational conduct of cultural practice and spirituality is profoundly affected by fundamental physical factors of resilience related to food, water, and energy security, and the intergenerational participation of youth. So this work is not so much an indictment of the system as it is an attempt to reveal at least two ways that the work of these young Indigenous people can be expedited: through the transformation of their education so that more of their time as youths is spent focusing on the wonderful attributes of their cultural associations with the lands, waters, and wildlife; and through the creation of a self-sustaining youth owned and operated enterprise that provides needed services to communities so they can adapt to and mitigate the increasingly variable, unpredictable, and dangerous effects and impacts of global heating and climate disruption.
ContributorsEricson, Mark (Author) / Brayboy, Bryan (Thesis advisor) / Sumida Huaman, Elizabeth (Thesis advisor) / Swadener, Elizabeth (Committee member) / Schugurensky, Daniel, 1958- (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
Food production and consumption directly impacts the environment and human health. Protein in particular has significant cultural and health implications, and how people make decisions about what type of protein they eat has not been studied directly. Many decision tools exist to offer recommendations for seafood, but neglect livestock or plant protein. This study attempts to address these shortcomings in food decision science and tools by asking the questions: 1) What qualities of a dietary protein-based decision tool make it effective? 2) What do people consider when making decisions about what type of protein to consume? Using literature review, meta-analysis, and surveys, this study attempts to determine how the knowledge gained from answering these questions can be used to develop an electronic tool to engage consumers in making sustainable and healthy decisions about protein consumption. The data show that, given environmental and health information about the protein types, people in the sample of farmers market shoppers are more likely to purchase wild salmon and organically grown soybeans, and less likely to purchase grain-fed beef. However, the order of preference among the six types of protein did not change. Additional results suggest that there is a disconnect between consumers and sources of dietary protein, indicating a need for improved education. Inconsistency in labeling and information regarding protein types is a large source of confusion for consumers who participated in the survey, highlighting the need for transparency. Results of this study suggest that decisions tools may help improve decision making, but new ways of using them need to be considered to achieve this.
ContributorsGeren, Sarah (Author) / Gerber, Leah (Thesis advisor) / Minteer, Ben (Committee member) / Wentz, Elizabeth (Committee member) / Arvai, Joseph (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
Wildlife endangerment and extinction is a significant and pressing issue. Environmental research notes that if humans hope to preserve wildlife, change needs to occur within the next decade. Therefore, it is important to understand the kinds of messages young adults are receiving about wildlife. This communication may affect their attitudes, beliefs, and ideals toward nature. Communication and socialization remain significant factors in cultivating environmental values in individuals. Memorable messages remain a socialization tool utilized to promote values in others.
This study explores the kinds of wildlife messages and underlying values individuals receive by asking them to recall a memorable wildlife message. The study analyzed 108 memorable messages from individuals between the ages of 18-35. The study employs a content analysis to examine message content and values. The study employed sensitizing concepts, such as Stern's Value-Belief-Norm theory to examine the messages’ underlying values, such as altruism and progressivism. Results indicate messages revolve around themes of preservation, stewardship, sanctity, domestication, and complexity of conservation. Of the 108 messages, 66 messages conveyed altruistic and progressive values as defined by Stern while other messages conveyed appreciation, awareness, and dominative values. Additionally, wildlife messages were received mostly through mediated sources. Implications for parents, the media, and wildlife are explored.
This study explores the kinds of wildlife messages and underlying values individuals receive by asking them to recall a memorable wildlife message. The study analyzed 108 memorable messages from individuals between the ages of 18-35. The study employs a content analysis to examine message content and values. The study employed sensitizing concepts, such as Stern's Value-Belief-Norm theory to examine the messages’ underlying values, such as altruism and progressivism. Results indicate messages revolve around themes of preservation, stewardship, sanctity, domestication, and complexity of conservation. Of the 108 messages, 66 messages conveyed altruistic and progressive values as defined by Stern while other messages conveyed appreciation, awareness, and dominative values. Additionally, wildlife messages were received mostly through mediated sources. Implications for parents, the media, and wildlife are explored.
ContributorsMays, Tiffany (Author) / Waldron, Vincent (Thesis advisor) / Kassing, Jeffrey (Committee member) / Nadesan, Majia (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016