07. 18. 2018

2018-2019 Doctoral Dissertation Fellows Announced

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The Graduate School is pleased to announce the 2018-2019 Doctoral Dissertation Fellows. The Doctoral Dissertation Fellowship (DDF) gives the University's most accomplished PhD candidates an opportunity to devote full-time effort to an outstanding research project by providing time to finalize and write a dissertation during the fellowship year. The award includes a stipend of $25,000 for the academic year (September-May), tuition for up to 14 thesis credits each semester (fall & spring), and subsidized health insurance through the Graduate Assistant Health Plan. Congratulations!

Adey Almohsen

History
Nation-Writing and Canon-Making: An Intellectual History of Palestinian Critiques in/of Exile
Advisor: Daniel Schroeter

Brandon Almy

Child Psychology
Self-Regulation and Adolescent Decision-Making
Advisor: Philip Zelazo

Evan Anderson

Chemistry
Ion-Transfer Voltammetry with Fluorous Matrices
Advisor: Phil Buhlmann

Sukaran Arora

Chemical Engineering
Mechanistic Insights of Methanol-to-Olefins Catalysis Over Zeolites
Advisor: Aditya Bhan

Anthony Auletta

Entomology
The Anatomical Distribution of Catecholamines in the Central Nervous Systems of the Arachnida and Their Roles in the Modulation of Behavior
Advisor: Karen Mesce

Sudhanya Banerjee

Bioproducts and Biosystems Science, Engineering and Management
Engineering, Economic, and Environmental Implications of Microalgae-based Multi-Product Biorefineries
Advisor: Shri Ramaswamy

Kari Campeau

Rhetoric and Scientific and Technical Communication
Improvising Ability: Making Meaning of Autism Outreach, Diagnosis, and Services
Advisor: Mary Schuster

Qingfeng Cao

Mechanical Engineering
SALSCS – A Pollution Cleaning System for Urban Air Remediation
Advisor: David Pui

Alina Cernasev

Social and Administrative Pharmacy
Understanding the Experience of HIV Medication Adherence from the Perspective of African-Born Minnesotans Taking Antiretroviral Therapy
Advisor: Jon Schommer

Hari Cherupalli

Electrical Engineering
Application-specific Design and Optimization for Ultra-Low-Power Embedded Systems
Advisor: John Sartori

Hui-Min Chuang

Chemical Engineering
Study of DNA Physics by a Genome-Mapping Technique
Advisor: Kevin Dorfman

Ryan Connell

Materials Science and Engineering
Controlling Light Propagation in Luminescent Solar Concentrators
Advisor: Vivian Ferry

Daniel Cooper

Family Social Science
Moderating Effects of Risk and Protective Factors on the Relationship between Trauma Exposure and Family Functioning Among Latinx Subgroups
Advisor: Elizabeth Wieling

Loren Cowdery

History
An Empire of Cities: The Logistics of State Power in the Roman Republic’s Empire (264-133 BCE)
Advisor: Andrew Gallia

Alexandra Crampton

Biomedical Engineering
A High-Throughput 3D Cell Culture Model for Practical Personalized Medicine
Advisor: David Wood

Tianbai Cui

Physics
Disorder Effects and Non-Equilibrium Dynamics on the Electronic Order of Strongly Correlated Materials
Advisor: Rafael Fernandes

Carly Danielson

Communication Studies
Bystanders to Bullying in College: An Application of the Bystander Intervention Model
Advisor: Susanne Jones

Guilhem De Hoe

Chemistry
Sustainable Cross-linked Polyester Elastomers
Advisor: Marc Hillmyer

Rebecca Distefano

Child Psychology
Parenting Influences on Self-Regulation in Preschoolers Experiencing Homelessness
Advisor: Stephanie Carlson

Ana Claudia Dos Santos Sao Bernardo

Hispanic and Luso Literatures, Cultures and Ling
From the Dumpster to Bookshelf: Afro-Brazilian Literature Written by Women and the Quest for Mobility from 1960s to the Present
Advisor: Ana Paula Ferreira

Joshua Egan

Conservation Sciences
Ecological and Evolutionary Processes in the Origins of the Latitudinal Diversity Gradient
Advisor: Andrew Simons

Grant Fahnhorst

Chemistry
An Organic Chemist's Approach to Sustainable Polymers
Advisor: Thomas Hoye

Amy Fairgrieve

English
I've Got a Bad, Bad Feeling: Rethinking Negative Affect in Literary Studies
Advisor: Andrew Elfenbein

Mojtaba Fakhraee

Water Resources Science
Advisor: Sergei Katsev

Yadan Fan

Health Informatics
Automated Extraction Information of Dietary Supplements Information from Clinical Notes in Electronic Health Records
Advisor: Rui Zhang

Jessica Farrell

History
(Re)Capturing Empire: A Reconsideration of Liberia’s Precarious Sovereignty and American Empire as Exception in the 19th Century
Advisor: Helena Pohlandt-McCormick

Adam Fix

History of Science, Technology and Medicine
Sensible Mathematics: The Science of Music in the Age of the Baroque
Advisor: Victor Boantza

Jesse Fosheim

Mechanical Engineering
Soalr Fuels via Solar Chemical-Looping Methane Reforming
Advisor: Jane Davidson

Elena Gambino

Political Science
On Lesbian Existence: Making a Scene after the Feminist 1990s
Advisor: Nancy Luxon

Gautham Gampa

Pharmaceutics
Improving the Delivery of Molecularly-Targeted Therapies for the Treatment of Primary and Metastatic Brain Tumors
Advisor: William Elmquist

Amanda Gorton

Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior
Adaptation in Ragweed Across Timescales of Environmental Change
Advisor: Peter Tiffin

Ghazaleh Haghiashtiani

Mechanical Engineering
3D Printing Electromechanical Transducers and Their Application in Development of Dynamic Organ Models
Advisor: Michael McAlpine

Jacob Held

Chemical Engineering
Atomic-Scale TEM Characterization of Complex Nanocrystals
Advisor: K. Andre Mkhoyan

Veronica Horowitz

Sociology
Towards a Sociology of Mercy: A Mixed-Methods Multi-Level Analysis
Advisor: Chris Uggen

Wenchao Jiang

Computer Science
Bridging Heterogeneous Wireless Technologies in IoT with Cross-Technology Communication
Advisor: Tian He

Anthony Jimenez

Sociology
Imperial Medicine: An Ethnography of Immigrant Experiences after the Affordable Care Act
Advisor: Lisa Sun-Hee Park

Jin Jin

Biostatistics
BayesianHierarchical Models for the Detection of Prostate Cancer Using Multi-ParametricMRIData
Advisor: Joseph Koopmeiners

Christopher Jonathan

Computer Science
Luna: An Adaptive Context-Aware Crowdsourcing Framework
Advisor: Mohamed Mokbel

Ezekiel Joubert III

Education, Curriculum and Instruction
Educational Migrations: A Critical Narrative Study on the Economies of Black Student Movement in a Rural Southeast Michigan Community
Advisor: Timothy Lensmire

Elif Kalaycioglu

Political Science
The World Heritage System: Construction and Crisis of Universal Value in Global Politics
Advisor: Raymond Duvall

Simrat Kang

Feminist Studies
Ecologies, Economies, and Resilience: Vietnamese/American Resistance in Southeast Louisiana's Commercial Fisheries
Advisor: Jigna Desai

Yagmur Karakaya

Sociology
Imperial Daydreaming About the Ottoman Past: Turkey as a Case Study in State-Sponsored Nostalgia.
Advisor: Teresa Gowan

Jisu Kim

Mass Communication
Influence of Incorporating Citizen Eyewitness Images in the News on Audiences' Trust in the News Organizations and News Engagement
Advisor: Jisu Huh

Megan Kobiela

Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior
How Butterflies Respond to Anthropogenic Change
Advisor: Emilie Snell-Rood

Vighneswara Siva Santosh Kondeti

Mechanical Engineering
Plasma-Solid/Liquid Interactions: A Novel Approach to Green Chemical Processing and Wound Healing
Advisor: Peter Bruggeman

Shannon Kordus

Microbiology, Immunology and Cancer Biology
Mechanisms of Susceptibility and Resistance to Para-Aminosalicylic Acid in Mycobacterium Tuberculosis
Advisor: Anthony Baughn

Molly Kupfer

Biomedical Engineering
3D Printing to Recapitulate Cardiac Tissue Structure, Development, and Function
Advisor: Brenda Ogle

Ethan Leng

Biomedical Engineering
Computer-Aided Detection of Prostate Cancer on Multiparametric MRI
Advisor: Gregory Metzger

Richie Lenne

Psychology
Sustaining Behavioral Changes: A Dynamical Systems Approach to Behavioral Medicine
Advisor: Alex Rothman

Sha Li

Psychology
Characterizing Learning Processes in Lung Cancer Detection: Human and Deep Learning
Advisor: Yuhong Jiang

Justin Lines

Neuroscience
Cortical Astrocyte - Neuronal Network Pathophysiology in Alzheimer's Disease In Vivo
Advisor: Alfonso Araque

Chih Hung Lo

Biomedical Engineering
Discovery of Small-Molecule Inhibitors of Protein-Protein Interactions by FRET-Based High-Throughput Screening and Structure-Based Drug Design
Advisor: Jonathan Sachs

Lotus Lofgren

Plant Biological Sciences
New Tools to Illuminate Fungal Host Specificity: From Mechanisms to Ecosystems
Advisor: Peter Kennedy

Morgan Meissner

Molecular, Cellular, Developmental Biology and Genetics
Comparative Analyses of Molecular Mechanisms of Human Retroviral Replication
Advisor: Louis Mansky

Milica Milic

Anthropology
Negotiating Responsibility: Ethics of Choice and Care in Postsocialist Oncology Wards in Serbia
Advisor: Karen-Sue Taussig

Carrie Miller

Anthropology
Does Paternity Dertainty Elicit Protection and Support of Offspring by Male Gelada Monkeys?
Advisor: Michael Wilson

Dylan Mohr

Comparative Literature
Desiring the Captive Mind: Film, Visual Media, and the Siberian Prisoner of War Camps of WWI
Advisor: Cesare Casarino

Florencia Montal

Political Science
Investment Arbitration and its Discontents: The Reform of International Investment Treaties
Advisor: Ron Krebs

Sara Morsy

Computer Science
Data-Driven Methods for Course Selection and Degree Plan Generation
Advisor: George Karypis

Mirko Musa

Civil Engineering
Local and Non-Local Geomorphic Effects of Marine and Hydrokinetic Turbines: Bridging Renewable Energy and River Morphodynamics
Advisor: Michele Guala

Sarah Namugenyi

Microbiology, Immunology and Cancer Biology
Determining the Role of Mycobacterium Tuberculosis PhoY Proteins in Persistence and the Identification of New Counter-Immune Mechanisms
Advisor: Anna Tischler

Justin Nelson

Biomedical Informatics and Computational Biology
Genomic Approaches for Characterizing How Chemicals Act on Cells
Advisor: Chad Myers

Vegard Nygaard

Economics
The Determinants of High and Rising Life Expectancy Inequality
Advisor: Timothy Kehoe

Xiaoxue Qiu

Nutrition
Mechanistic Understanding of Chronic Inflammation Development During Obesity and Aging
Advisor: Xiaoli Chen

Veronica Quillien

Education, Curriculum and Instruction
Bog or to Fix What has been Disturbed: Researching Back to Re/make the Culture of the Bàsàa People of Cameroon
Advisor: Mary Hermes

Sandra Rellier

Hispanic and Luso Literatures, Cultures and Ling
Recovering the Memories of European-Africans: Pieds-Noirs and Retornados
Advisor: Ana Paula Ferreira

Joel Runnels

Aerospace Engineering and Mechanics
Joint Position and Attitude Estimation using Astrophysical Signals of Opportunity
Advisor: Demoz Gebre-Egziabher

Sarah Saddler

Theatre Arts
Training Corporate Bodies: Organizational Theatre in Global India
Advisor: Margaret Werry

Elizabeth Schneider

Geography
Multi-Scale Perspectives of Fire Activity in the Upper Great Lakes Region of Minnesota
Advisor: Kurt Kipfmueller

Allison Schwartz

History
Banking on Women’s Worth: Personhood and the Persistence of Gender Inequality in America’s New Debt Economy, 1961-2008
Advisor: Elaine Tyler May

Yunli Shao

Mechanical Engineering
Integrated Vehicle Dynamics and Powertrain Operation Optimization for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles
Advisor: Zongxuan Sun

Yanning Shen

Electrical Engineering
Nonlinear Models for Topology Inference and Learning over Graphs
Advisor: Georgios Giannakis

Narendra Singh

Aerospace Engineering and Mechanics
Thermochemistry Modeling of Air for Hypersonic Flows
Advisor: Thomas Schwartzentruber

Aradhya Sood

Economics
Land Aggregation Frictions and Large Scale Manufacturing in India
Advisor: Thomas Holmes

Sara Sterner

Education, Curriculum and Instruction
A Post-Intentional Phenomenological Exploration of Reading Whitely
Advisor: Marek Oziewicz

Wentao Tang

Chemical Engineering
Network Decomposition for Distributed Control and Optimization
Advisor: Prodromos Daoutidis

Xun Tang

Computer Science
Mining Spatial Patterns from Big Data
Advisor: Shashi Shekhar

Tatsuro Tanioka

Earth Sciences
Marine Phytoplankton and Global Environmental Change
Advisor: Katsumi Matsumoto

Viengneesee Thao

Health Services Research, Policy, and Administration
Economic Model of Maternal Opioid Use Disorder: Projecting Cost and the Effect of Treatment to Inform Value-Based Care and Policy
Advisor: Karen Kluntz

Joshua Thiede

Microbiology, Immunology and Cancer Biology
Targeting Intrinsic Resistance Mechanisms to Potentiate Antitubercular Drugs
Advisor: Anthony Baughn

Kelsey Vitense

Natural Resources Science and Management
Shallow Lakes in Minnesota: Can We Predict the Good, the Bad, and the Vulnerable?
Advisor: John Fieberg

William Vogel

History of Science, Technology and Medicine
From War on Germs to Germs for War: Biological Weapons and American Biomedicine in the Early Cold War
Advisor: Susan Jones

Matthew Vollmer

Chemistry
Heterobimetallic Cooperativity for Chemical Catalysis: Making Metal Atoms WorkTogether in New and Unexpected Ways
Advisor: Connie Lu

Yan Wang

Chemistry
Field-Effect Modulation of Electrochemistry on Two-Dimensional Materials
Advisor: C. Daniel Frisbie

Everett Wenzel

Mechanical Engineering
Numerical Methods for the Simulation of Turbulent Multiphase Flows
Advisor: Sean Garrick

Amanda Wolfson

Germanic Studies
Positioning Genocide: Comparing the Holocaust and the Genocide of American Indians in Public History
Advisor: Leslie Morris

Jie Xue

Computer Science
Efficient Geometric Computing on Stochastic Datasets
Advisor: Ravi Janardan

Chenglong Ye

Statistics
Model Selection and Estimation for High-dimensional Data Analysis
Advisor: Yuhong Yang

Ethan Young

Psychology
The Cognitive Consequences of Early Childhood Adversity
Advisor: Jeffry Simpson

Biqiong Yu

Physics
Synchrotron X-ray Scattering Study of Copper-Oxide Superconductors
Advisor: Martin Greven

Ahmed Zamzam

Electrical Engineering
Intelligent Monitoring and Control for Next-GenerationSmart Grids
Advisor: Nikos Sidiropoulos

Wenjia Zhang

Chemical Engineering
Cell Membrane Stabilization by Block Polymers - A Novel Therapeutic Approach for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy
Advisor: Frank Bates

Yang Zhang

Computer Science
Securing and Enhancing Networks via Data-driven Analytics and Network Function Virtualization
Advisor: Zhi-Li Zhang

Tao Zhang

Materials Science and Engineering
Overcoming Loss Pathways to Unlock High Efficiency in Organic Solar Cells
Advisor: Russell Holmes

Chen Zhang

Public Affairs
In-­Between People and Places: Collective Identity Formation in Chinese Rural-­to-­Urban Migrants’ Community‐Defending Movements
Advisor: Kathy Quick

Zhengyang Zhao

Electrical Engineering
Development of Spintronic Devices for Ultra-Energy-Efficient Non-volatile Memory and Logic Applications
Advisor: Jian-Ping Wang

Jincheng Zhou

Biostatistics
Bayesian Causal Inference Methods for Meta-analysis of Randomized Clinical Trials: Does the Research Involve Animal or Human Subjects?
Advisor: Haitao Chu