Mobile traffic is expected to grow tenfold by 2019, topping 24 exabytes of monthly traffic and accounting for nearly half of all Internet traffic. This growth is driven by the increasing number of smart phones and tablets, and the data demands of high bandwidth services enabled by next-generation cellular networks...
The concept of deportation has become increasingly important in recent years, as states more and more turn to removal as a technique of control over population and territory. But within the field of political theory the concept of deportation has not yet received the attention it deserves. This dissertation helps...
Achievement gaps between students from different SES and racial/ethnic backgrounds stubbornly persist despite decades of policy interventions. My dissertation focuses on several unexpected sources of stress and disruption that may be related to the achievement gap: sunlight exposure, a sister’s teen childbearing, and nearby violent crime. I demonstrate that these...
After 9/11 there was a shift in the rhetoric surrounding counter-terrorism. Suddenly, the language of risk, security and prevention was being utilized to justify a new set of global financial regulations headed up by international organizations such as the United Nations, The Financial Action Task Force, and the IMF/World Bank....
This dissertation contains two studies. In Chapter 1, I implement a randomized intervention to measure the effect of reminders for timely payment of credit cards. While I find an 13% reduction in the cost of late payment fees paid, 31% of the users that avoid credit card late payments, incur...
This dissertation explores the relationship between institutions of political participation and environmental protection. What is the relationship and how is it constituted? How are participatory institutions put into motion, and how do they operate? What are the effects of these institutions? Are participatory institutions desirable from an environmental perspective and...
The scope of this thesis extends to the study of surface structures and electronic properties in a number of complex oxides. The c(6x2) surface reconstruction on SrTiO3 (001) was solved using a combination of plan view transmission electron microscopy imaging, atomic resolution secondary electron imaging, and density functional theory calculations....
This dissertation explores the renewed historical significance of the (geo)political demand to redraft national constitutions in the Americas. Building on previous work, my dissertation constructs a transnational lens to underline the intersectionality of the social struggles that catalyzed the Venezuelan Constituent Assembly process begun in 1999 and the Ecuadorian experience...
This dissertation presents a Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) study of a novel anisotropic superconductor, HgBa$_{2}$CuO$_{4+\delta}$ (Hg1201) and unconventional strain dependence of the mean free path of silica aerogel. Hg1201 is one of the most structurally simple cuprates known. Therefore, it is an ideal compound in investigation of various phases in...
Age-related cognitive deficits are observed in both humans and animals. Yet, the molecular mechanisms underlying these deficits are not yet fully elucidated. In aged animals, a decrease in intrinsic excitability of pyramidal neurons from the CA1 sub-region of hippocampus is believed to contribute to age-related cognitive impairments, but the molecular...