Scholarworks

ScholarWorks is an open access repository for the capture of the intellectual work of Montana State University (MSU) in support of its teaching, research and service missions. MSU ScholarWorks is a central point of discovery for accessing, collecting, sharing, preserving, and distributing knowledge to the Montana State University community and the world.

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Mendel elucidated: Big Science comes to the humble garden pea
(Elsevier BV, 2025-06) Weeden, Norman F.
News flash: in a recent article by Feng et al., one of Mendel ‘factors’ is shown not to result in the expected 3:1 segregation ratio, and about half of the traits he investigated are produced by large insertions or deletions. Do genetic textbooks need to be revised?
Does the Adoption of iXBRL Improve Data Usability? Evidence From Future Earnings Response Coefficients
(Wiley, 2025-04) Zhang, Yimei; Shan, Yuxin
This paper examines how the adoption of iXBRL affects future earnings response coefficients (FERCs), which measure investors’ ability to predict future performance and impound the prediction into the current-year stock price. By following the research design of Ettredge, Kwon, Smith, and Zarowin (2005) and Kim, Kim, and Lim (2019), we find that the adoption of iXBRL is positively associated with FERCs. This finding indicates that investors can better anticipate the future performance from iXBRL filings and reflect it on the current stock price. We also find that the number of standardized and extension tags can strengthen the association between iXBRL adoption and FERCs, demonstrating the benefit of those two tags in enhancing investors’ capabilities to analyze complex financial disclosures. Our findings are informative to the SEC regarding the effectiveness of the iXBRL mandate. We also contribute to the emerging literature on iXBRL adoption and the usability of iXBRL filings.
Network of networks: Time series clustering of AmeriFlux sites
(Elsevier BV, 2025-06) Reed, David E.; Chu, Housen; Peter, B. G.; Chen, Jiquan; Abraha, Michael; Amiro, B. D.; Anderson, Ray G. et al.; Knowles, John F.
Environmental observation networks, such as AmeriFlux, are foundational for monitoring ecosystem response to climate change, management practices, and natural disturbances; however, their effectiveness depends on their representativeness for the regions or continents. We proposed an empirical, time series approach to quantify the similarity of ecosystem fluxes across AmeriFlux sites. We extracted the diel and seasonal characteristics (i.e., amplitudes, phases) from carbon dioxide, water vapor, energy, and momentum fluxes, which reflect the effects of climate, plant phenology, and ecophysiology on the observations, and explored the potential aggregations of AmeriFlux sites through hierarchical clustering. While net radiation and temperature showed latitudinal clustering as expected, flux variables revealed a more uneven clustering with many small (number of sites < 5), unique groups and a few large (> 100) to intermediate (15–70) groups, highlighting the significant ecological regulations of ecosystem fluxes. Many identified unique groups were from under-sampled ecoregions and biome types of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP), with distinct flux dynamics compared to the rest of the network. At the finer spatial scale, local topography, disturbance, management, edaphic, and hydrological regimes further enlarge the difference in flux dynamics within the groups. Nonetheless, our clustering approach is a data-driven method to interpret the AmeriFlux network, informing future cross-site syntheses, upscaling, and model-data benchmarking research. Finally, we highlighted the unique and underrepresented sites in the AmeriFlux network, which were found mainly in Hawaii and Latin America, mountains, and at under-sampled IGBP types (e.g., urban, open water), motivating the incorporation of new/unregistered sites from these groups.
Open-population models provide an alternative trout monitoring method in the upper Yellowstone River, Montana
(Oxford University Press, 2025-06) Briggs, Michelle A.; Glassic, Hayley C.; Guy, Christopher S.; Opitz, Scott T.; Rotella, Jay J.; Schmetterling, David A.
Objective. Long-term monitoring programs typically require standardization to evaluate changes in fish populations over time. However, incorporating new methods into long-term monitoring programs may become increasingly important as climate change affects sampling conditions. In the upper Yellowstone River, Montana, biologists have monitored trout abundance using closed-population, Lincoln–Petersen mark–recapture methods since 1978. In the past two decades, changes in the hydrologic regime have prevented monitoring from occurring annually. Methods. We investigated the feasibility of individually marking trout and using the POPAN formulation of the Jolly–Seber model to estimate the abundance and survival of three trout species in the upper Yellowstone River as an alternative to historical monitoring methods. When using this modeling framework, annual sampling can be conducted in a reduced time period, allowing monitoring to be adapted to changing environmental conditions. Results. Analysis of a 3-year empirical data set provided estimates of abundance and survival for most sites and species. Simulations indicated that POPAN models produced unbiased estimates of demographic parameters when detection probability was 0.20 or greater, and the precision of estimates increased as detection probability and apparent survival increased. Conclusions. Using POPAN models to analyze mark–recapture data from individually marked fish may provide a feasible alternative for monitoring trout populations in the upper Yellowstone River. Although further evaluation of monitoring methods as data collection continues is warranted, open-population models show promise as a useful tool for monitoring the trout fishery in the Yellowstone River and in rivers across Montana.
Montana K-12 Educator Needs Assessment Survey Report 2024
(Montana State University NSF EPSCoR, 2024) Taylor, Suzi; Richter, Rebecca; Boone, Madison; Chipps, Jeannie; Pearson, Jack
This report is an encapsulation of the professional development needs and interests of Montana K-12 educators, with a particular emphasis on teachers of STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering and mathematics). We believe these findings provide a unique opportunity for Montana University System researchers and others with access to STEM resources to strategize on how those resources can be shared with the K-12 education community, thus advancing the broader impacts of our research. Findings in this report can also offer insights to school administrators, other professional development providers and agencies that support classroom teachers.