Utah Tech University

Hiking is a popular outdoor activity with approximately 45 million participants in the United States each year. The growing popularity of hiking has given rise to an increasing number of hiking-related deaths. Within the U.S. State of Utah and Zion National Park, the Angels Landing Trail has been identified as a trail recording a high number of hiking deaths. The popular trail ascends 454 m and is lined with slippery edges and steep drop-offs along its 8 km roundtrip trail. The most minor mistakes will easily result in death. Utilizing a case study approach, this study identified unsafe hiking behavior, pre-existing health conditions, the physical environment, and the social environment as primary contributing factors in hiking fatalities on the trail. In the 1950s – 1960s guard rails were added to the trail, in 2010 a total of 55 meters of posts and chains were installed along the trail, and in 2022 Zion National Park instituted a permit system aimed at reducing overcrowding and improving the hiking experience. Since 2022, only a single hiking death has been recorded on the trail. Further monitoring of the trail is warranted so that of the number of fatalities and the factors contributing to any death can be compared from before and after the implementation of the permit system.

The gender wage gap in early-career family medicine results in female physicians earning nearly $32,000 less annually than their male counterparts, with significant lifetime financial impacts. Modeling this disparity over a 25-, 30-, and 35-year career reveals that, without interventions, female physicians could accumulate $2.0 to $4.4 million less than male physicians, underscoring the need for systemic changes to address gender-based pay inequities in the medical profession.

Research addressing the link between victimization experiences and fear of crime finds that intimate partner violence (IPV) victimization is also of consequence, with victims of IPV being more fearful than non-IPV victims. Though research on the IPV-fear link is plentiful, there is an absence of focusing exclusively on crime victims. The focus of this research is on the potential differential effects of IPV and other types of victimization on victims' fear and if it delineates to gender differences in victimization type and victim fear. This study uses the National Crime Victimization Survey data to examine whether IPV victims display higher levels of fear compared to victims of other relationship types and whether these relationships hold for males and females. Results indicate that IPV victimization does have a positive relationship with fear and that the effect is evident among females but not males.

Traditional voltage-controlled switches have been widely used in RF transceivers, reconfigurable antennas switching, and signal routing. However, issues with power consumption, thermal stability, switching speed, and design complexity. This paper introduces a novel metasurface absorber made of highly absorptive composite materials for temperature-driven RF switch applications. An in-house built, octagonal-shaped metasurface absorber using carbonyl paint on an aluminum oxide substrate is proposed and demonstrated as the thermal source for such RF switch. Temperature increases were observed for varying RF transmitted power and its corresponding heat generation was detected via thermal imaging. The heat analysis calculated the corresponding absorbed power by the absorber. Both simulated and measured results show over 90% absorptivity across $9.5-13 ~\mathrm{GHz}$. The absorber achieved a maximum of ${9 7.8 5 \%}$ absorption of transmitted power at $f / D=1$. Carbonyl paint enhanced absorptivity by 15% compared to aluminum oxide alone, demonstrating potential for thermally activated phase-changing material-based RF switches.

In the literature so far, for Caputo fractional boundary value problems of order 2q when 1<2q<2, the problems use the same boundary conditions of the integer-order differential equation of order ‘2’. In addition, they only use the left Caputo derivative in computing the solution of the Caputo boundary value problem of order 2q. Further, even the initial conditions for a Caputo fractional differential equation of order nq use the corresponding integer-order initial conditions of order ‘n’. In this work, we establish that it is more appropriate to use the Caputo fractional initial conditions and Caputo fractional boundary conditions for sequential initial value problems and sequential boundary value problems, respectively. It is to be noted that the solution of a Caputo fractional initial value problem or Caputo fractional boundary value problem of order ‘nq’ will only be a Cnq solution and not a Cn solution on its interval. In this work, we present a methodology to compute the solutions of linear sequential Caputo fractional differential equations using initial and boundary conditions of fractional order kq, k=0,1,…(n−1) when the order of the fractional derivative involved in the differential equation is nq. The Caputo left derivative can be computed only when the function can be expressed as f(x−a). Then the Caputo right derivative of the same function will be computed for the function f(b−x). Further, we establish that the relation between the Caputo left derivative and the Caputo right derivative is very essential for the study of Caputo fractional boundary value problems. We present a few numerical examples to justify that the Caputo left derivative and the Caputo right derivative are equal at any point on the Caputo function’s interval. The solution of the linear sequential Caputo fractional initial value problems and linear sequential Caputo fractional boundary value problems with fractional initial conditions and fractional boundary conditions reduces to the corresponding integer initial and boundary value problems, respectively, when q=1. Thus, we can use the value of q as a parameter to enhance the mathematical model with realistic data.

The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association estimates that approximately 40% of Americans will suffer some sort of balance issue in their lifetime, resulting in impaired mobility or constant disorientation. In order to provide personalized physical therapy for patients, and help physical therapy physicians better understand the areas of the foot that may lead to issues with imbalance, the proposed balance board is designed to mechanically move to very specific angles in one axis at a high enough speed to break the balance of the user on the board. The shift in pressure distribution in the user's feet can then be tracked throughout the balance recovery period through pressure mats. This design can allow researchers and physicians to better target the areas in the foot that may be damaged and the cause of balance issues. The proposed system is portable, easy to use by patients and researchers, and low cost, all without sacrificing the quality of the data being collected. In order to help researchers and physical therapy physicians better understand the areas of the foot that may lead to issues with imbalance, the proposed balance board is designed to mechanically move to very specific angles in one axis at a high enough speed to break the balance of the user on the board. The shift in pressure distribution in the user's feet will then be tracked throughout the balance recovery period through pressure mats. This design can allow researchers and physicians to better target the areas in the foot that may be damaged and the cause of balance issues, and further can be expanded to various intervention therapy such as nerve stimulation, sensory augmentation, etc.

Reverse electrowetting-on-dielectric (REWOD) energy harvesting is an effective energy harvesting method at low frequencies such as the frequencies of human motion. Various REWOD energy harvester designs have been presented in prior works, but these generally use rigid and often expensive substrates and time-consuming and/or costly fabrication methods. To address these challenges, in this work REWOD energy harvesters were fabricated consisting of aluminized polyester sheets as the functional layers and with polycarbonate sheets for added mechanical support. The fabrication of these samples eliminates the need for costly materials, clean room technologies, and high-end equipment. Samples were characterized using a flat arrangement and on a test fixture that simulates the repeated bending that occurs on the back of a bending knee. Without applying any external bias voltage, the maximum voltage and current output for the bending samples were determined to be 25.1 mV and 230 nA, respectively, and the corresponding maximum power is 5.77 nW at a bending frequency of 5 Hz. With an estimated cost of U.S. <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${\$}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>0.28 for each REWOD harvester (U.S. <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${\$}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>0.03/cm2), the cost per nanowatt of power is U.S. <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${\$}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>0.05/nW, which is approximately 380 times lower than the approximately U.S. <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${\$}$ </tex-math></inline-formula>19/nW of our previous REWOD energy harvesters. Our simple devices provide a low-cost, easily fabricated flexible approach to wearable motion sensing and energy harvesting that can be useful for various healthcare applications.

11168 Background: Precision medicine is a paradigm shift in healthcare: 24% of all FDA approvals are precision medicines, with 67% of new approvals relying on companion or complementary testing or on diagnostics prior to clinical use. Yet a recent publication indicates that approximately 64% of potentially eligible patients could be lost due to various clinical practice gaps along patient journey (Sadik et al JCO 2022). Low prevalence biomarker testing is proven to be one of the critical determinants of missed therapy, potentially due to poor physician awareness. The increasingly advanced machine learning (ML) and natural language processing (NLP)-based ability to label, analyze, and segment data can be utilized to monitor and influence testing behavior in real-time. We hypothesize that a real-time data-driven physician-targeted digital engagement can increase biomarker testing rate and in turn enhance patient identification for precision therapies. Methods: Unstructured real-world, real-time biomarker testing reports were collected from 494 laboratories across the US. These testing reports were first curated, labeled and extracted via ML and NLP-based technologies to allow data analysis and reveal testing behavior. Suboptimal testing behavior was defined as no requisition of the selected novel biomarker as part of the diagnostic workups. Physicians who identified as having suboptimal testing behavior were selected as candidates to receive a personalized digital engagement over a 4-week period. The digital engagement's purpose was to raise clinical awareness towards the novel biomarker testing. The follow-up testing behavior was analyzed again over laboratory reports collected from 26-weeks’ time after the initial engagement. Results: 822 physicians were identified with suboptimal testing behavior and selected to receive 4 weeks' follow-up digital engagement. 271 out of 822 (33%) recipients were successfully engaged shown as open and read the digital communication. 42 (~15%) physicians reacted to the communications and ordered the new test at least once during this period. The initial 4 weeks' engagement was observed to be the most impactful, when 23 out of the 42 (~55%) physicians ordered the novel biomarker test for the first time.71 new therapy-eligible patients were identified via data-driven targeted physician digital engagement during the 26 weeks’ follow-up period. Conclusions: This study illustrates the value of data in influencing or reinforcing testing behaviors and emphasizes the value of data-driven physician-targeted digital engagement in addressing clinical practice gaps which in turn, drive patient identification to match potential eligible precision therapies.

While there are a number of studies that note religious individuals do not adhere precisely to the formal doctrines and policies of their faith, few prior studies have attempted to explain why religious individuals dissent from their religion’s official positions. We draw on a religious reflexivity framework with a mixed-methods approach to data collection. The quantitative data is from a survey of Utah residents ( n = 1,909) and provides a rough estimate of the percentage of Mormons who do not hew perfectly to the official position of the religion. The qualitative interviews ( n = 20) illustrate that the members who hold more permissive attitudes toward abortion are aware of their dissent and articulate clear reasons for it. Members who hold more restrictive attitudes appear to be unaware that their views are more extreme than their religion’s teachings. Yet, both more and less restrictive groups tend to use their religion’s teachings—interpreted through varied moral systems—to justify their dissent.