Other Engineering Commons^™

Reference Data Set Of Volcanic Ash Physicochemical And Optical Properties, A. Vogel, S. Diplas, A. J. Durant, A. S. Azar, M. F. Sunding, William I. Rose, A. Sytchkova, C. Bonadonna, K. Krüger, A. Stohl

William I. Rose

Uncertainty in the physicochemical and optical properties of volcanic ash particles creates errors in the detection and modeling of volcanic ash clouds and in quantification of their potential impacts. In this study, we provide a data set that describes the physicochemical and optical properties of a representative selection of volcanic ash samples from nine different volcanic eruptions covering a wide range of silica contents (50–80 wt % SiO₂). We measured and calculated parameters describing the physical (size distribution, complex shape, and dense-rock equivalent mass density), chemical (bulk and surface composition), and optical (complex refractive index from ultraviolet to near-infrared ...

Examining Accident Reports Involving Autonomous Vehicles In California, Francesca Favaro, Nazanin Nader, Sky Eurich, Michelle Tripp, Naresh Varadaraju

Faculty Publications

Autonomous Vehicle technology is quickly expanding its market and has found in Silicon Valley, California, a strong foothold for preliminary testing on public roads. In an effort to promote safety and transparency to consumers, the California Department of Motor Vehicles has mandated that reports of accidents involving autonomous vehicles be drafted and made available to the public. The present work shows an in-depth analysis of the accident reports filed by different manufacturers that are testing autonomous vehicles in California (testing data from September 2014 to March 2017). The data provides important information on autonomous vehicles accidents’ dynamics, related to the ...

Hispanic Maternal And Children's Perceptions Of Neighborhood Safety Related To Walking And Cycling, Norma Olvera, Dennis W. Smith, Chanam Lee, Jian Liu, Jay Lee, Stephanie Kellam, Jun-Hyun Kim

Jian Liu

This study examined neighborhood safety as perceived by children (mean age=10 years) and their mothers, and its association with children's physical activity. For all eight safety items examined, children perceived their environment as less dangerous than mothers (p<0.05). None of the multiple regression models predicting children's physical activity by safety perceptions were significant (p>0.10). The maternal perception model explained the highest percentage of variance (R2=0.26), compared to the children's perception model (R2=0.22). Findings suggest that future studies should explore relations between self-reported and objectively measured safety barriers to Hispanic youth walking and cycling.

A Review Focujsed On The Psychological Effectiveness Of Tai Chi On Different Populations, Long Zhang, Thomas Lowder, Jian Liu

Jian Liu

No abstract provided.

Local Dynamic Stability Associated With Load Carrying, Jian Liu, Thurmon E. Lockhart

Jian Liu

Objectives: Load carrying tasks are recognized as one of the primary occupational factors leading to slip and fall injuries. Nevertheless, the mechanisms associated with load carrying and walking stability remain illusive. The objective of the current study was to apply local dynamic stability measure in walking while carrying a load, and to investigate the possible adaptive gait stability changes. Methods: Current study involved 25 young adults in a biomechanics research laboratory. One tri-axial accelerometer was used to measure three-dimensional low back acceleration during continuous treadmill walking. Local dynamic stability was quantified by the maximum Lyapunov exponent (maxLE) from a nonlinear ...

Aging Effect On Foot Dynamics During Unexpected Slips, Jian Liu, Thurmon E. Lockhart

Jian Liu

Slip-induced fall accidents have been recognized as a serious threat to the health of the elderly.The objective of the current study was to investigate the aging effect on the biomechanical reactions of both perturbed foot and unperturbed foot to the unexpected slips. Nineteen younger (mean age: 25.0 years old) and twenty-one older (mean age: 71.2 years old) adults were involved in a laboratory study,in which slippery surface was induced during walking without their awareness.The reactive responses of both slipping foot and unperturbed foot were quantified by optical motion capture system and force platforms.The results ...

Silver Nanoparticle Removal From Drinking Water: Flocculation/Sedimentation Or Filtration?, Desmond F. Lawler, Anne M. Mikelonis, Ijung Kim, Boris L.T. Lau, Sungmin Youn

Sungmin Youn

Silver nanoparticles are used in a wide variety of consumer products and are therefore rapidly becoming ubiquitous in the natural environment; they can be expected to be found in the natural waters used as drinking water supplies. This research investigated whether such particles could be expected to be removed in conventional water treatment plants such as flocculation and filtration. Both flocculation and granular media filtration experiments with citrate-capped silver nanoparticles were performed at different ionic strengths and in the presence and absence of natural organic matter. The results were generally consistent with theories of particle destabilization that have been developed ...

Evaluation Of Stability Of Unit Loads For Tilt And Shock Events During Distribution, Jay Singh, Koushik Saha, Tyler Sewell

Journal of Applied Packaging Research

Initiatives to lightweight and reduce packaging materials to achieve sustainability goals have created unit load stability challenges in the transportation and handling of palletized packaged goods. Consequently, an increased focus is being placed on evaluating how current pre-shipment performance tests evaluate load stability. This study was undertaken to address the current need for establishing test methodologies towards observing a unit load’s overall stability during transportation and handling related activities commonly experienced in the distribution environment. With this goal, this study developed two test methods as well as apparatus/measuring tool to observe a palletized load’s overall stability. The ...

The Advent Of University-Level Packaging Scholarship: The Time, The Place And The People, Diana Twede, Laura Bix

Journal of Applied Packaging Research

In 1952, Michigan State College (MSC), now Michigan State University (MSU), was the first university in the world to offer a Bachelor of Science degree in Packaging. Other universities had previously offered related courses like canning (as part of a food science degree) or military packaging (in wartime), but MSU was the first to propose packaging as its own academic field of scholarship.

Other universities followed, sharing faculty and curriculum models developed at MSU. As a result, graduates’ careers in packaging now have a higher professional status, and universities play a key role in developing our international community of packaging ...

Damping Package Design Using Structural Corrugated Board, Qi Zhang, Katsuhiko Saito, Katsushige Nagaoka

Journal of Applied Packaging Research

Packaging is designed to protect products from shock and vibration during transport. In recent years, paper cushioning materials, such as corrugated board and pulp molded packaging, are being increasingly used because they are environmentally friendly and easy to recycle. However, because no efficient packaging-design method yet exists for paper cushioning material, packaging engineers must rely on previous experience and the so-called trial-and-error method to design packaging. One reason for this situation is that, for most cases, the paper cushioning material used for protective packaging has a complicated structure and deforms after being subjected to repetitive shock and vibration. To address ...

Reference Data Set Of Volcanic Ash Physicochemical And Optical Properties, A. Vogel, S. Diplas, A. J. Durant, A. S. Azar, M. F. Sunding, William I. Rose, A. Sytchkova, C. Bonadonna, K. Krüger, A. Stohl

Department of Geological and Mining Engineering and Sciences Publications

Uncertainty in the physicochemical and optical properties of volcanic ash particles creates errors in the detection and modeling of volcanic ash clouds and in quantification of their potential impacts. In this study, we provide a data set that describes the physicochemical and optical properties of a representative selection of volcanic ash samples from nine different volcanic eruptions covering a wide range of silica contents (50–80 wt % SiO₂). We measured and calculated parameters describing the physical (size distribution, complex shape, and dense-rock equivalent mass density), chemical (bulk and surface composition), and optical (complex refractive index from ultraviolet to near-infrared ...

Nuclear Weapons In A Changing Climate: Probability, Increasing Risks, And Perception, Adam Liska, Tyler R. White, Eric Holley, Robert J. Oglesby

Adam Liska Papers

Many people tend to think that the outcome of any nuclear weapons use today will result in an escalatory situation with apocalyptic outcomes for the countries involved. Yet many factors are increasing the probability of the limited use of nuclear weapons (e.g., 1 to 20 warheads) in a range of conflict scenarios. Previous atmospheric model simulations of regional nuclear conflicts employing many relatively small bombs have been estimated to cause a global “nuclear autumn,” with great reductions in agricultural productivity, stratospheric ozone loss, and spread of hazardous radioactive fallout. The totality of these effects would result in widespread ...

A Study In The Use Of Elastic Materials In Expandable Containment Units, Andrew J. Eisenman, Joby Anthony Iii, David Satagaj

Montview Liberty University Journal of Undergraduate Research

The rigidity of materials in conjunction with the aspect of elasticity has been a concern of modern technologies and construction in recent centuries because of the advantages that expandable storage would bring to the fields of containment units with respect to population growth and space exploration. The world population is currently growing at an exponential rate, and as our population grows, the more important it will become to have containment units that can both contain large volumes of material as well as minuscule amounts of material without wasting space. In order accomplish this, we will need a new type of ...

Liquefied Natural Gas (Lng) As A Marine Fuel: Optimising The Associated Infrastructure In The Baltic Sea Region, Dimitrios Dalaklis Dd, Josefin Madjidian Jam, Aykut I. Ölçer Aio, Fabio Ballini Fb, Momoko Kitada Mk

Conference papers

International and national policies and regulations call for faster transition to sustainable energy production and use. Within the shipping industry one way forward is the use of LNG. Despite being of fossil origin LNG is considered to be an important step towards cleaner shipping given the better properties of the exhausts. The Go LNG initiative is focused on the development of demand and accessibility of LNG in the Baltic Sea Region (BSR). Activities associated with this strategic-in-nature project aim to promote the implementation of EU’s Clean Fuel Strategy and boost LNG usage through the whole transport chain. This paper ...

Gas Collection, Haorong Li, Yanshun Yu, Daihong Yu

Architectural Engineering -- Faculty Publications

A system includes a vessel configured to couple with a gas source for drawing gas into the vessel. The vessel is also configured to receive liquid. The system includes an over flow port in fluid communication with the environment external to the vessel. The overflow port is configured to separate gas within the vessel from the external environment. The system also includes an overflow conduit having an end within the overflow port so that when gas pressure within the vessel increases, liquid is received by the over flow conduit. Another system includes a tank defining an air space for receiving ...

Space Perception In Virtual Environments: Displacement From The Center Of Projection Causes Less Distortion Than Predicted By Cue-Based Models, Jonathan W. Kelly, Melissa Burton, Brice Pollock, Eduardo Rubio, Michael Curtis, Julio De La Cruz, Stephen B. Gilbert, Eliot H. Winer

Jonathan W. Kelly

Virtual reality systems commonly include both monocular and binocular depth cues, which have the potential to provide viewers with a realistic impression of spatial properties of the virtual environment. However, when multiple viewers share the same display, only one viewer typically receives the projectively correct images. All other viewers experience the same images despite displacement from the center of projection (CoP). Three experiments evaluated perceptual distortions caused by displacement from the CoP and compared those percepts to predictions of models based on monocular and binocular viewing geometry. Leftward and rightward displacement from the CoP caused virtual angles on the ground ...

Evaluation Boundary And Design Method For Insulating Packages, Liao Pan, Jun Wang, Lixin Lu

Journal of Applied Packaging Research

To evaluate the failure potential of insulated packaging to heat outside, a so-called evaluation boundary for insulating packages was proposed for designing and estimating insulating packages based on the heat transfer law between the environment and a packaged product through packaging. Three evaluation parameters were suggested for describing the failure mechanism of insulating packages. The validity of the presented evaluation boundary was verified by the experimental data. Finally, a new design method of insulating packages based on the boundary was proposed and an application example was performed as a demonstration. The results indicated that the three evaluation parameters (which are ...

Los Angeles Air Force Base Fitness Center, Colin White

Culminating Experience Project Reports in Fire Protection Engineering

The purpose of this report is to evaluate the life safety features of the Los Angeles Air Force Base Fitness Center, located on Los Angeles Air Force Base in El Segundo, California. This report is produced in partial fulfillment of the requirements of a Master’s of Science in Fire Protection Engineering from the Fire Protection Engineering Program at California Polytechnic State University’s San Luis Obispo Campus. This analysis approaches life safety in the fitness center from two angles. First, a prescriptive approach is used to evaluate the building’s compliance with current codes and standards that govern construction ...

Taft Community College- New Student Center- Fire And Life Safety Analysis, Matthew Winston

Culminating Experience Project Reports in Fire Protection Engineering

The following report is a fire and life safety investigation into a new facility. The planned facility is a new Student Center at Taft Community College. The prescriptive requirements as set forth by the most up to date codes and standards chosen for the project are met. The building has been properly classified with respect to occupancy and construction type. Appropriate design for interior partitions and exterior walls have been identified. Interior finish requirements are elaborated so that adherence to these guidelines is made clear. The fire sprinkler system has an adequate supply of water from the municipal water supply ...

Assessment Methods From Around The World Potentially Useful For Public Transport Projects, Eric Bruun, Marianne Vanderschuren

Journal of Public Transportation

The financial crisis in 2008/2009 has made many countries aware that public funds need to be managed better. A logical step is to identify methods that thoroughly assess the impacts of infrastructure and service investment. The authors argue that assessments should both identify and use performance indicators related to the ‘triple bottom line’, i.e. economic, social and environmental impacts.

This paper provides an overview of assessment methods used to evaluate public transport investments. Positive and negative aspects of various assessment tools are identified and discussed. Some developing world examples appear to be more elaborate and appropriate, than developed ...