Meet the Research Recruits (AY 2019-2020)
Alexis WorldsResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Paul Croft The Learning Commons - Marketing for Awareness to Improve Satisfaction and Access This project was designed to apply marketing and communication skill sets to the advertisement of Student Support Services in the Learning Commons and to provide an understanding of user awareness, access, and satisfaction. This included an examination of the services (e.g., Writing, Public Speaking, Tutoring) and collections available (e.g., books, ebooks, reading reserve) from the Learning Commons to the Kean Community. The intent was to take the initial steps of implementation of a marketing strategy and campaign for the Sp20 Semester with regard to resources and expectations. The creation and delivery of a marketing plan was focused on increasing and encouraging the broader use of the facility and its resources and to make the Learning Commons "the place" for students to pursue their academic work and professional development. The project made use of surveys, the website, and other information to examine when, where, and why students go to study, attend workshops, and to improve themselves. By using marketing strategies with preliminary findings of this project it is shown that students seek availability of both resources and a wide variety of spaces for multiple purposes. The project offers specific recommendations within a draft marketing plan as to the delivery and communication of Learning Commons products, services, and spaces to students on a more relateable level to improve and increase awareness, access, and satisfaction. |
Brianna ParedesResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Constance Hassett-Walker Online Hate Speech and the First Amendment According to the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, “Congress shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…” However, Supreme Court cases have established some limits to free speech, particularly if the speech poses a threat to public safety. While some speech may be ugly, such as support for white supremacy, it would likely be considered protected speech under the First Amendment. Online threats to a specific person or group of individuals would likely not be protected under the First Amendment and could result in the person making the threat getting arrested. The goal of this study is to assess the nature of some online hate speech, and determine whether it should be protected under the First Amendment. |
Christopher CalvacheFaculty Research Mentor: Dr. Kim Spaccarotella Evaluating Lunch Bags to Determine Food Safety Guidelines The function of a lunch bag is to allow food to be consumable for a few more hours compared to leaving the food at room temperature. The purpose of the experiment is to evaluate different lunch bags to determine if they keep food safe following The United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) food safety guidelines and whether the lunch inside the lunch bags is still consumable for the user after 2 hours or more. Four lunch bags were assessed with the same contents: a 1 ½ ounce of cheese sandwich with 1 cup of vegetables and ½ cup of sliced fruit located in plastic containers inside the lunch bag, along with 1 freezable ice pack placed in the middle of each bag between the sliced cheese sandwich and the containers of fruits and vegetables. To measure temperature during the two hour intervals, a meat thermometer and a timer app were used to determine whether the food was still consumable, based on the food safety guidelines provided by the (USDA). As a result, in each lunch bag, the temperature steadily increased above 40 degrees Fahrenheit that was located in the lunch bags. To conclude, an alternate approach with the same outcome may be more suitable to provide a better evaluation for food contents inside the lunch bags. A recommendation may be to add more ice packs or place the ice packs in a different position inside the lunch bags, especially if the lunch kept out of the refrigerator. |
Gurmukh BediFaculty Research Mentor: Dr. Daehan Kwak Virtual Help Desk Using Google Home as a Virtual Receptionist As time progresses people are diverting towards technology where more and more places are making their working spaces smart with smart devices. Some of these smart devices include smartphones, Google Home, Amazon Alexa, smart locks and security cameras. Despite the advances in smart devices, there still lacks smart platforms in universities especially for help resources generally due to the cost. Help resources to answer academic-related questions are essential for students, staff and faculty. With the current smart technologies, facilitating and providing the personalized help resources can be made available. In this study, an AI-algorithm is developed and implemented to a virtual assistant, the Google Home, that will help students get answers to questions they need and reduce the traffic for the human receptionist. A decision dialogue tree is implemented onto Google Home by using DialogueFlow and corresponding actions are carried out using the IFTTT API and creating Applets. This data will contain mostly all the questions that students ask daily to a receptionist. For example, “What courses do I need to major in Computer Science” or “What time is a professor’s office hours?”. The responses will include answers to these questions such as “Here’s a list of all the courses you need, should I send it to your email?” or “You can book this professor at this website”. As a proof of concept, the virtual help desk is deployed near the department entrance and users will fill out a short questionnaire to analyze the quality of help and the answers that were provided. We anticipate virtual help desk will be beneficial for students, staff, and faculty. |
Hugo BurgosFaculty Research Mentor: Professor Craig Konyk Climate change is an indelible part of our present-day lives. The devastating wildfires in the Amazon, widespread famines and extreme droughts in India, massive floods, deadly hurricanes, and I can keep going. All that we’re seeing more and more of these days will cease to be statistical anomalies and instead be more like seasonal markers. With so much heat-trapping carbon in the atmosphere, there will be, in effect, no turning back. We must accept we have lost the war on climate change. Inspired by Engineer John P. Allen’s design the project Biosphere is a self-sustaining city inside a bubble. I aim to create a better version of a city that can sustain human life on Mars. |
Jia LvFaculty Research Mentor: Dr. Kai Wang Using AI in business This research focuses on the use of AI in business. With the progress of science and technology, more and more people pay attention to AI and apply AI in more business scenarios. AI can use computational power to help people, such as conducting analytical problem-solving and facilitating decision making. AI can help people analyze and take advantage of big data. Large shopping websites like Amazon can collect and utilyze customers’ preferences through AI. However, it also raises some important questions: can AI replace human decision-makers in some ways? What is the boundary of AI usage? This article will discuss the application of AI in different business scenarios to analyze the impact of AI and when it should be used. |
Jose RodriguezFaculty Research Mentor: Dr. Daehan Kwak A Web-based Decision Tree to Enhance the Capacity of Care Managers Individuals with mental illness and substance die 10-20 years earlier than the general population and it is not uncommon for mental health problems and substance abuse to occur at the same time where, for example, such individuals who experience a mental illness also are addicted to alcohol or other drugs. Care Managers play serve a critical role to promote care services and serve these individuals to help address their needs to increase positive health outcomes. However, most care managers that deliver care management services are with minimal training and experience. Care managers do not require formal training and often need consultation when providing guidance to consumers. Seeking guidance from supervisors and getting back to the consumer is a lengthy process and supervisors are not always available when guidance is needed. In this research, we develop a web-based interactive decision tree called Caremanag-e, that will guide care managers through a decision-making process embedded in a best practice framework enabling them to optimally address the needs and serve these individuals. The decision trees are constructed based on the Social Determinants of Health (SDoH) and from case studies conducted by healthcare professionals and is used to identify the consumer’s needs of resources and healthcare. The app is implemented using tools, such as HTML5 and CSS3 for the website, with SQL-server database, and JS libraries such as jQuery, and JointJS. The CareManag-e app will be piloted for real use in real scenarios while data is collected to improve and enhance the decision tree. In addition, the case manager’s competence and self-efficacy will be measured through baseline and follow up self-report surveys and performance appraisals. |
Katelyn Bryant & Justine BurnettResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Dongyan Mu Life cycle assessment of industrial production of heterotrophic microalgal oil at a commercial scale A life cycle assessment was conducted to evaluate the environmental impacts of bio-oil produced from heterotrophic microalgae Chlorella protothecoides and Schizochytrium. An autotrophic comparison was also conducted with Chlorella sp. in raceway ponds. Results showed the impacts of oil produced by heterotrophic Schizochytrium were lower than autotrophic Chlorella sp., whereas, the biofuel produced from heterotrophic Chlorella only had lower impacts than the autotrophic Chlorella in acidification, eutrophication, carcinogens and ecotoxicity. The algal fermentation stage accounted for 86% of total impacts. The harvest stage of heterotrophic algae caused fewer impacts than autotrophic algae due to high biomass density and oil content in algae. |
Kebira BelmaachiResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Julia Nevarez The Hudson Yards, New York City urban development and big data The primary purpose of this research is to understand the Quantified Community model for urban development as well as uses of big data through the case study of Hudson Yards located in New York, New York. The qualitative methods of participant observation and content analysis were utilized. A sample of six websites that showcase big data, the smart-city model, and Hudson Yard’s Quantified Community were selected. The materials were content analyzed for themes of big data, urban development, and the smart-city model. This research may benefit some research inquiries regarding technology and urban living. |
Liam Allen & Anibely TorresResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Jenny Li DETECTING BOUNDARIES OF PARKING LOTS AND DETECTING OCCUPIED SPACES WITHIN LOT USING DEEP LEARNING Identification of lot space by quadcopter with dynamic video feed position requires recognition of boundaries of a parking lot as well as classification of contents within said lot, such as cars, obstacles, and medians. Due to variations in classified objections, as well as potential movement and change of altitude by the drone, a neural network utilizing the Tensorflow library was chosen, with library and GPU acceleration supplemented by NVIDIA cuDNN. Due to the faster computational speeds compared to masking, lot detection and car detection was accomplished with a neural network using the faster_rcnn_resnet101_kitti (kitti) model as base architecture, which was then trained using sample data from the Cars overhead with Context (COWC) in tandem with the COCO dataset and a high definition satellite dataset from Google Maps. A rudimentary application was programmed to interpret frames of recorded MP4 video at about 4 FPS, recording the bounding boxes of the parking lot, cars, and empty lot space, and storing this information in .csv, .geojson, rbox, and .xml format, with a final visual output, displaying some basic statistics and existing bounding boxes. |
Omosalewa AkanmuResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Bok Jeong Relationship of Financial Performance and Accountability of Nonprofit Organizations: Focused on Human Service Nonprofits in New Jersey Omosalewa Akanmu is examining the relationship between financial performance and accountability of human service nonprofits in New Jersey. It performs descriptive analyses of major financial performance metrics including, but not limited to, fundraising efficiency, program expenses growth, and liabilities to assets. The accountability index, comprised of board independence, audited financials, board meeting documentation, and conflict of interest policy, will be assessed and compared. Then, it conducts a correlation analysis between financial performance and accountability/transparency. A total of 63 human service nonprofits’ data provided by Charity Navigator will be used for the research. This study will contribute to assessing how nonprofits’ financial management is associated with their accountability practices. |
Suzie YangResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Min-Chung Han University Students’ Acceptance of Using Instant Messenger Chatbots Several financial institutions have applied multipital digital technologies to provide University students personal finance knowledge and improve their literacy. This study aims to understand students’ acceptance of the chatbot to learn personal finance, and their intention to use the financial institutions. It also provides suggestions for developing effective chatbots to attract students. Based on the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), this research recruited thirty-one Kean University students as survey respondents. Results showed that the easier students felt using the chatbot, the more positive attitudes toward chatbot; however, their attitudes were not affected by perceived usefulness. Unlike what we expected, the positive attitude towards chatbot did not influence intention to use financial institutions. Thus, this result implies financial institutions should provide easy to use chatbot for consumers, they should also consider more factors influencing consumers’ decisions to choose financial institutions. Assessment of Kean University Students’ Financial Literacy |
Symone GelayResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Richard Conti The Effect Diagnostic Labeling has on Juvenile Offenders in Criminal Cases Dysexecutive Syndrome (DS) is a condition in which the executive functions of the brain have been compromised to some degree. This syndrome is closely associated with frontal lobe damage. Dysexecutive Syndrome can be found in children associated with attention deficit disorder (ADD) and/or attention deficit hyperactive disorder (ADHD) or due to minor traumatic brain injury (mTBI). This ongoing project seeks to distribute a pilot study in effort to contribute to the research within the psychological and criminal justice disciplines within Juvenile theories. We hypothesize DS onset by a congenital neurological factor will elicit a lesser sentencing recommendation than DS which is onset by an acquired neurological factor. |
Ulysses GreenResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Sut Sakchutchawan Business Strategies for A Competitive Advantage: An Innovation Case Study Organizations must make exceptional strides to have an articulate and well-defined strategy that will survive in today’s competitive market. Establishing strategies that are both efficient and effective will directly result in aiding the firm’s long-term viability. These integrative standardized strategies can improve business operations allowing the firm to meet their objectives. This research paper aims to identify the key components that make certain business strategies successful. With the correct strategies identified, as a result, I will recommend the implementation of successful strategies so a firm can run optimally and possibly achieve a competitive advantage. This paper will include a case study of an innovative company with an exceptional business strategy with an analysis of the various components that give the firm's competitive advantage. |
Victor BretonesResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Elizabeth Hyde William Livingston, The Privy Council, The Council of War and Safety and The Logistics of War William Livingston, New Jersey’s first elected governor, led the state of New Jersey through the turbulent times during the American Revolution. As governor, Livingston was leader of the Privy Council, a statewide advisory board. The council-controlled and provisioned the New Jersey Militia in collaboration with the Council of Safety. An examination of his papers and public decrees will show how Livingston, through scrupulous work through careful administration and working with leaders at the time like George Washington and others, was able to provide for the New Jersey Militia and was able to guide New Jersey through the Revolution. |
Destiny MooreResearch Faculty Mentor: Dr. Elizabeth Manheim Drosophila Genetics: Mapping of mps1 transgenes Meiosis and mitosis are essential to the survival of all organisms; the formation of a bipolar meiotic or mitotic spindle is critical to proper segregation of chromosomes and successful cell division. In order to understand these processes, we study the phenotypes of mutations in the genes required for these cell cycles. With the major advances in Bioinformatics and Molecular Genetics, we have learned or inferred much about the roles of the genes involved. However, sometimes we cannot determine the exact role of a specific gene because the mutants are embryonic lethal. Many of the spindle assembly mutants are lethal, indicating the significance of their role to the organism; in order to study such mutants in Drosophila, we use transgenic constructs (both wild type and mutant) to compensate for the lethality. monopolar spindle-1 (mps-1) is a spindle checkpoint gene responsible for kinetochore attachment and ensuring that the spindle is properly built before giving the cell permission to progress through the cell cycle. We are using a “reverse genetics” approach to further analyze the role of mps1 in mitosis and meiosis. Through in vitro mutagenesis, we have introduced targeted mutations in the gene and made both wild type and mutant constructs with a variety of promoters, including the native promoter and an inducible one. These constructs will be injected into Drosophila embryos to generate transgenic larvae with the goal of germline integration. In this research class, students will rear and mate these injected larvae/flies, followed by mapping of the transgenes and production of balanced stock lines. Once balanced stocks have been established, the students will complete phenotypic analyses, assessing rescue of the embryonic lethality and nondisjunction phenotypes in mps1 and other meiotic/mitotic mutant backgrounds. We will use the wild type and mutant transgenes to study the interaction of Mps1 with other integral meiotic and mitotic proteins. |