Dissertations: October 4, 2021
DISSERTATIONS DEFENDED
Astronomy
Mohammed, Steven. Probing the ultraviolet Milky Way. Sponsor: David Schiminovich.
Biological Sciences
Al-Zain, Amr. Mutagenic repair outcomes of DNA double-strand breaks. Sponsor: Lorraine Symington.
Buckmaster, Marlene. Retroviral replication and restriction. Sponsor: Stephen Goff.
Biomedical Engineering
Colburn, David. Wearable biosensors for mobile health. Sponsor: Samuel Sia.
Field, Rachel. Ultrasound-responsive microcapsules for localized drug delivery applications. Sponsor: Samuel Sia.
Cellular, Molecular, and Biomedical Studies
Hobson, Benjamin. Subcellular molecular profiling of midbrain dopamine neurons. Sponsor: David Sulzer.
Chemical Engineering
Yeong, Vivian. Engineering protein electrostatics for phase separated synthetic organelles. Sponsor: Allie Obermeyer.
Hobson, Benjamin. Subcellular molecular profiling of midbrain dopamine neurons. Sponsor: Peter Sims.
Communications
Sirrah, Avantika. Invisible ads. Sponsor: Michael Schudson.
Earth and Environmental Sciences
Huang, Yanjie. A revolution domesticated: Negotiating family life in urban China, 1959-1984. Sponsor: Eugenia Lean.
Nghiem, Athena. Exploring the scales of environmental variability in redox processes and groundwater arsenic distribution through data-driven approaches. Sponsor: Benjamin Bostick.
Electrical Engineering
Teh, Min Yee. Optically-enabled high performance reconfigurable interconnection networks. Sponsor: Keren Bergman.
Yang, Teng. In-situ and In-field temperature and transistor BTI sensing techniques with microprocessor-level implementation. Sponsor: Mingoo Seok.
French and Romance Philology
Haziza, David. Witches, Jews, and redemption through sin in Jules Michelet's La Sorcière. Sponsor: Antoine Compagnon.
History
Mukherjee, Sayantani. Geography triumphant: Maps, cartographic truths, and imperial frontier-making in Tibet in the long nineteenth century. Sponsor: Manan Ahmed.
Reich, Robin. Materials of science in Norman Sicily: Translation, transmission, and trade in the central Mediterranean corridor. Sponsor: Adam Kosto.
Slezkine, Peter. The discovery of the free world: A history of U.S. foreign policy. Sponsor: Anders Stephanson.
Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies
Ghoshal, Sayori. The measure of minority: Producing unequal citizens through science and politics, India 1870-1950. Sponsor: Partha Chatterjee.
Hanine Shatou-Shehadeh, Suad. (Dis)honorable Zionists? Christian honor in Jewish Zionist ideology and subjectivity. Sponsor: Joseph Massad.
Mechanical Engineering
Omofuma, Isirame. Strategies for improving reactive postural control. Sponsor: Sunil Agrawal.
Operations Research
Xu, Xiao. Variable clustering methods and applications in portfolio selection. Sponsor: Xunyu Zhou.
Physics
Wang, Tianle. Kaon to two-pion decay and pion-pion scattering from lattice QCD. Sponsor: Norman Christ.
Political Science
Carr, Matthew. Judging ideology: The polarization of choosing judges for the circuit courts of appeals, 1891-2020. Sponsor: Jeffrey Lax.
Kilibarda, Anja. Deep divides: Experiments on public opinion toward and among minority groups in the United States and Canada. Sponsor: Donald Green.
Religion
Fisher, Joseph. Enhancing 'Human Nature': The human enhancement debate in U.S. bioethics. Sponsor: Mark Taylor.
Sustainable Development
Wang, Xueting. Essays in energy economics and industrial organization. Sponsors: Geoffrey Heal and Ignacia Mercadal.
TC / Clinical Psychology
Graber, Liat. Clients' internal representations of psychotherapists across different modalities. Sponsor: Barry Farber.
TC / Cognitive Science in Education
Halpern, Mariel. Youth apprenticeship in reasoned discourse: The power of learning by doing. Sponsor: Deanna Kuhn.
TC / English Education
Coggins, Iain. Commonplace for self-reflexivity in English language arts. Sponsor: Robert Fecho.
DISSERTATION PROPOSALS FILED
Art History and Archaeology
Beeson, John. Culture war formations: Globalization, imagined communities, and art in the late 20th century.
Girard, Virginia. Geomythology and the lived environment in early Netherlandish painting.
Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics
Chen, Xu. A novel game-theoretic framework for the autonomous mobility ecosystem in mixed traffic.
Chemical Engineering
Li, Xinhao. Understanding degradation of Li-ion battery cathode materials using first-principles calculations.
East Asian Languages and Cultures
Gyal, Palden. Shifting terrains of authority & loyalty: Buddhist government on the peripheries of the Tibetan plateau.
Sogo, Alexander. The limits of compassion: Disability, gender, and the body in medieval Japanese Buddhism.
Zhao, Xinyi. Cinema as a quest for modernity: Film culture, spectatorship, and colonial (after) lives of Manchukuo.
English and Comparative Literature
Hitchcock, Emma. Genres of knowing: Early medieval conversion and the epistemological others of the English church.
Earth and Environmental Sciences
Acquisto, Tanner. Influence of along-strike and downdip variations in crustal structure on megathrust slip behavior in the Alaska, Sumatra and Nicaragua subduction zones.
Kim, Joohee. Reconstruction of the North Atlantic deep water end-member of the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation through the Pleistocene.
Oelkers, Rose. New insights for tropical dendrochronology in northern Bolivia.
Mechanical Engineering
Lagrota, Carly. Multiscale data-driven modeling of foundational combustion reaction systems.
Political Science
Marwege, Rebecca. A happy triad? - Grassroots, political and technocratic approaches to climate change.
Psychology
Bloom, Paul. Into the multiverse: Methods for studying developmental neuroscience.
Religion
Komanapalli, Kripanand. Becoming Dalit: Making Telegu Christian religion, migration, and identity in the 20th century.