Vassar College Digital Library

Vassar Scholarship

Vassar Scholarship, the institutional repository formerly known as Digital Window, reflects the research and scholarly output of the Vassar College community.  It provides access to a variety of collections, including senior theses and projects across a wide range of disciplines.

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Vassar Scholarship

Automatic control: the vertebral column of dogfish sharks behaves as a continuously variable transmission with smoothly shifting functions

Publication Date
2016-July-07
Document Type
article
Authors
Marianne E. Porter
Ewoldt, Randy H.
Long, John H., Jr.
Department or Program
Biology Department
Cognitive Science Department
Document Type
Article
Abstract

During swimming in dogfish sharks, Squalus acanthias, both the intervertebral joints and the vertebral centra undergo significant strain. To investigate this system, unique among vertebrates, we cyclically bent isolated segments of 10 vertebrae and nine joints….

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Vassar Scholarship

Built for speed: strain in the cartilaginous vertebral columns of sharks

Publication Date
2014-February-01
Document Type
article
Authors
Porter, M. E.
Diaz, Candido, Jr.
Sturm, Joshua J.
Grotmol, Sindre
Summers, A.P.
Long, John H., Jr.
Department or Program
Biology Department
Cognitive Science Department
Document Type
Article
Abstract

In most bony fishes vertebral column strain during locomotion is almost exclusively in the intervertebral joints, and when these joints move there is the potential to store and release strain energy. Since cartilaginous fishes have poorly mineralized vertebral centra, we...

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Vassar Scholarship

Child brides in India

Publication Date
2011-January-01
Document Type
working paper
Authors
Johnson-Lans, Shirley
Patricia Jones
Department or Program
Economics Department
Document Type
Working Paper
Abstract

This paper investigates the determinants of child marriage using a new data set from rural India. Specifically, we focus on an extreme form of child marriage--that is, the marriage of girls under the age of ten. No other study to...

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Vassar Scholarship

Do NGOs make a difference: a case study of rural Rajasthan

Publication Date
2008-July-01
Document Type
working paper
Authors
Johnson-Lans, Shirley
Department or Program
Economics Department
Document Type
Working Paper
Abstract

An empirical analysis of effects of NGO interventions on health and education of women and girls in rural Rajasthan employs an original micro data set to address criticisms of NGO effectiveness. Isolating the effects of the NGO's programs from personal...

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Vassar Scholarship

Does post-graduate education affect women's investment in health? A study of the determinants of preventative health

Publication Date
2005-October-01
Document Type
working paper
Authors
Johnson-Lans, Shirley
Department or Program
Economics Department
Document Type
Working Paper
Abstract

Does the well established positive association between education and investment in health hold for education beyond college? This study examines the effect of having a postgraduate degree on investment in health, using an original data set composed of samples of...

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Vassar Scholarship

Testing biological hypotheses with embodied robots: adaptations, accidents, and by-products in the evolution of vertebrates

Publication Date
2014-November-12
Document Type
article
Authors
Roberts, Sonia F.
Hirokawa, Jonathan
Rosenblum, Hannah G.
Sakhtah, Hassan
Gutierrez, Andres A.
Porter, Marianne E.
Long, John H., Jr.
Department or Program
Biology Department
Cognitive Science Department
Document Type
Article
Abstract

Evolutionary robotics allows biologists to test hypotheses about extinct animals. In our case, we modeled some of the first vertebrates, jawless fishes, in order to study the evolution of the trait after which vertebrates are named: vertebrae. …

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