Digital Commons Network^™

Modeling And Analysis Of Pca Workflow, Ewing Tiong

Masters Theses

Nursing shortage has been reported as a major problem faced not only by the United States but also by many other countries. One of the many interventions that has been used to curb nursing shortage is the increase in employment of Unlicensed Assistive Personnels (UAPs) as an alternative care delivery model. There are many types of UAP and one of them are Patient Care Assistants (PCAs). This research proposes a methodology to model and analyze the work ow of a PCA in terms of completing assigned tasks in a timely manner. The specific objectives of this research are to model …

Simulation Of Lateral Migration And Sedimentation Of A Flexible Fiber In A Vertical Weak Shear Flow, Ali Ibrahim Neamah Neamah

Masters Theses

This research is a thorough numerical investigation and critical analysis of lateral migration of a deformable particle settling in a vertical weak shear flow. Under the vertical weak shear fluid, the deformable particle may move either to the coagulation area, or the dispersion area, depending on Reynolds numbers, shear Reynolds number, fiber flexibility, and aspect ratio. In this study, a lattice Boltzmann equation is used to solve Navier-Stokes equation and a flexible particle method is employed to attack the problem of motion of a flexible fiber. A bounce-back rule is used to deal with moving boundaries interacting with fluids. Several …

An Integrated Framework For Cardiac Sounds Diagnosis, Zichun Tong

Masters Theses

The Phonocardiogram (PCG) signal contains valuable information about the cardiac condition and is a useful tool in recognizing dysfunction and heart failure. By analyzing the PCG, early detection and diagnosis of heart diseases can be accomplished since many pathological conditions of the cardiovascular system cause murmurs or abnormal heart sounds. This thesis presents an algorithm to classify normal and abnormal heart sound signals using PCG. The proposed analysis is based on a framework composed of several statistical signal analysis techniques such as wavelet based de-noising, energy-based segmentation, Hilbert-Huang transform based feature extraction, and Support Vector Machine based classification. The MATLAB …

Signage Recognition Based Wayfinding System For The Visually Impaired, Abdullah Khalid Ahmed

Masters Theses

Persons of visual impairment make up a growing segment of modern society. To cater to the special needs of these individuals, society ought to consider the design of special constructs to enable them to fulfill their daily necessities. This research proposes a new method for text extraction from indoor signage that will help persons of visual impairment maneuver in unfamiliar indoor environments, thus enhancing their independence and quality of life.

In this thesis, images are acquired through a video camera mounted on glasses of the walking person. Frames are then extracted and used in an integrated framework that applies Maximally …

Computer Aided Brain Tumor Edge Extraction Using Morphological Operations, Warqaa Shaher Alazawee

Masters Theses

Detecting the precise boundary of the area containing a recognized brain tumor is a complex problem and must be addressed since it applies to many medical modalities and tumor types. The objective of this thesis is to provide an efficient algorithm for detecting edges of brain tumors to help neurosurgeons identify the border of the critical area and distinguish the precise margin of the tumor from the rest of the brain tissue during the surgery. This thesis work exploits MRI brain tumor images as a tool to aid surgeons. MRI image segmentation is an essential step as a preliminary process …

Design Of A New Digital Relay For Transmission Line Fault Detection, Classification And Localization Based On A New Composite Relay And Artificial Neural Network Approach, Ahmed Sabri Altaie

Masters Theses

This thesis focuses on new approach to detect, classify, and localize the fault in transmission line. Firstly, fault detection was carried out using the New Composite Relay (CR) which, has different characteristics and the ability to detect any type of fault including series faults. Secondly, fault classification was conducted using the Feed Forward Artificial Neural Network (FFANN). In addition, the fault classification led to the investigation of the best use of the FFANN. The data used come from MATLAB/SIMULINK three phase series compensated network. The results obtained using FFANN, were compared with the type of the fault that have been …

Control Of Cation Ordering In Zinc Tin Nitride And In-Situ Monitoring Of Growth, Brian Christopher Durant

Masters Theses

Semiconducting materials with a band gap around 1.5 eV are very much sought after due to their close match to the solar spectrum. However, some compounds that have shown promise for highly efficient solar cells contain rare, expensive, and sometimes toxic elements, such as indium and gallium. As such, a search for earth abundant materials has become more prominent recently. One such earth abundant semiconducting material that has garnered interest is ZnSnN₂. It has been shown through previous studies that there is the possibility of continuously tuning the band gap between 1.0 and 2.0 eV by controlling the …

Implementing A Linear Quadratic Spacecraft Attitude Control System, Daniel Kolosa

Masters Theses

This thesis implements a linear quadratic attitude control system for a low-thrust spacecraft. The goal is to maintain spacecraft alignment with a time-varying thrust vector needed for trajectory change maneuvers. A linear quadratic attitude control approach is used to maintain spacecraft pointing throughout flight. This attitude control strategy uses the thrust-acceleration input obtained from a linear quadratic optimal trajectory control model that simulates the trajectory of a spacecraft in orbit maneuvers. This attitude model simulates a CubeSat, a small satellite that is equipped with a low-thrust propulsion and attitude control system. An orbit raising and a plane change scenario is …

Design Of Digital Down Converter Chain For Software Defined Radio Systems On Fpga, Nagarjun Marappa

Masters Theses

Modern communication systems have increasingly attempted to trade off the digital signal processing for analog circuitry. In performing this tradeoff, advanced algorithms have been implemented in both custom programmable hardware and in software; such systems are commonly called Software Defined Radios (SDR). Advanced software defined radios consist of highly configurable hardware and computers used as digital signal processing (DSP) platforms that provide the technology for realizing current and future generations of digital wireless communication infrastructure. Many sophisticated signal processing tasks are performed in SDR, including compression algorithms, channel estimation, equalization, forward error correction and protocol management. This research has focused …

Formulation And Evaluation Of Soy Polymer Based, Gravure Printed Resistive Inks For Applications In Printed Electronics, Bhushan Hiralal Patil

Masters Theses

Today, the majority of the commercially available conductive inks are formulated using expensive metallic particles, such as silver and gold. Most of the inks use volatile solvents in the formulation, which are hazardous to the environment as emission of VOCs is the major concern. In the case of water-based inks, usually petroleum-based acrylic polymers are used. Apart from being nonrenewable raw materials, acrylic polymers are carcinogenic in nature. Also, acrylic polymers are used in a variety of applications, such as the automotive, medical device, paint, and adhesive industries. Often times, the ink industry has to compete with other industries for …

A High Performance Architecture For An Exact Match Short-Read Aligner Using Burrows-Wheeler Aligner On Fpgas, Dana Abdul Qader

Masters Theses

Due to modern DNA sequencing technologies vast amount of short DNA sequences known as short-reads is generated. Biologists need to be able to align the short-reads to a reference genome to be able to make scientific use of the data. Fast and accurate short-read aligner programs are needed to keep up with the pace at which this data is generated. Field Programmable Gate Arrays have been widely used to accelerate many data-intensive bioinformatics applications.

Burrows-Wheeler Transform has been used in the theory of string matching which has led to the development of many short-read alignment programs. This thesis presents a …

Morphology Based Framework For Improved Driver's Visibility In Inclement Weather Conditions, Saleem Farhood Hussein

Masters Theses

The U.S. Department of Transportation reports that on average there are 5,870,000 vehicle accidents each year. Twenty-three percent (23%) of these accidents are attributed to weather conditions with an annual average of more than 6,000 people are killed and 480,000 people are injured. Weather-related accidents occur mainly because of the low visibility on the roads under inclement conditions such as snow, rain and fog. While these conditions can be predictable and individuals try to avoid driving in inclement weather, there are circumstances that require driving in such conditions such as emergency responders or when the severity of the storm has …

Low Melting Glass Frit As An Adhesion And Resistivity Promotor To Silver Nanoparticle Ink Photonically Sintered On Indium Tin Oxide Coated Glass, Jason J. Kleiner

Masters Theses

The objective of this study was the fabrication of a printed circuit resulting from the photonic drying/sintering of conductive circuits, printed using silver nano ink layered on a film of low melting glass frit onto indium tin oxide (ITO) coated glass substrate through the flexographic printing method. The fabrication process flow included material preparation, printing, and photonic drying/sintering in that order.

Investigation of the breakthrough photonic drying/sintering method was studied by varying sintering parameters, specifically the amount of heat energy applied to each specimen, and the speed at which it was applied. Additionally, the adhesion promoting properties of a never …

Oxidized Phospholipids Regulation Of The Monocyte Recruitment Parthway In Human Aortic Endothelial Cells, Piao Jian Tan

Masters Theses

Low-density lipoprotein particles in blood plasma invade the endothelium and become oxidized, creating risk of CHD associated with atherosclerosis, the main underlying condition in coronary heart disease. Oxidation products of the phospholipid 1-palmitoyl- 2-arachidonoyl-sn-glycerol-3-phosphatidylcholine (PAPC) are bioactive components of minimally oxidized LDL that stimulate endothelial cells that line the artery, leading to monocyte binding and atherosclerosis. It is hypothesized that the regulation of the monocyte recruitment pathway by these oxidized phospholipids is mediated by the binding of OxPAPC to one or more mediating proteins. Human recombinant VEGFR2, GRP78, and EP2bind to OxPNB, a biotinylated analog of OxPAPC, demonstrated using Western …

Evaluation Of The Safety Effectiveness Of Clearview Font And Fluorescent Yellow Sheeting On Michigan Freeways And Non-Freeways, Lusanni Mercedes Acosta Rodrieuez

Masters Theses

Halation or irradiation makes guide sign fonts difficult to read. Missing the necessary guide sign information causes anxiety and confusion to drivers, and hence may lead to crashes. In order to avoid or mitigate the situation a newer font, Clearview, is used to provide better readability at long distances. In a similar context the lack of brightness in sheeting material for warning signs reduces conspicuity of sings. Installation of fluorescent yellow sheeting has been done to provide signs with more noticeable and brighter materials. This observational before and after study is an evaluation of the safety and economic benefits of …

Impact Of Calendering And Silver Addition To Carbon Nanotube-Based Electrodes Used In Printed Multi-Layer Capacitors, Ramea Awni Al-Mubarak

Masters Theses

As the demand for global energy increases, the need for development of alternative clean and sustainable energy technology increases. Creating advanced energy devices with a large storage capacity plays a significant role in this development. This research focused on investigating the performance of capacitor devices used as energy storage cells by optimizing and determining the impact of silver percentage and structure (nano-wires or silver flake) added to CNT ink on the conductivity of printed layers, and studying the influence of calendering the multi-layer capacitor electrodes. Multi-layer capacitors were fabricated by screen printing three alternative layers of conductive and dielectric inks …

The Design Of Nanostructures From The Blending Of Flowing Agents Influencing Critical Properties Of A Pharmaceutical Formulation, Casey F. Kick

Masters Theses

In the pharmaceutical manufacturing process, it is well known that flowing agents such as MgSt and Cab-O-Sil widely affect critical flow properties that influence the finished product performance of oral dosage tablets. Though the effects of flowing agents are beneficial to some extent, the sensitivity of the pharmaceutical formulation to process shearing of flowing agents during blending can be catastrophic which often results in product and batch failures. Hence it is essential to study the concentration of flowing agents and chemical nature of active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) with respect to applied process shear on formulations. Previous studies have shown that …

Development And Verification Of A Method To Determine The Long Term Load Carrying Performance Of A Double Sided Pressure Sensitive Adhesive Tape, Rahal Rasheed

Masters Theses

Acrylic foam pressure sensitive adhesive (PSA) tapes are used in various applications as an alternative of mechanical fasteners, especially in areas like structural bonding which requires demanding bond strength and durability.

This research focuses on comparing design values of acrylic foam PSA using static shear test method and dynamic shear test method in accordance of J0MP0164 standard specification. Static shear test has lots of disadvantages; but on the other hand it is the test that mimics the real life usage of a tape in a real life application. Dynamic shear test is a faster way of testing and gives a …

Performance Analysis Of Distance Relay On Shunt/Series Facts-Compensated Transmission Line, Ahmed Kareem Lafta Al-Behadili

Masters Theses

Flexible Alternating Current Transmission Systems (FACTS) are increasingly being used to enhance the efficiency and reliability of power system networks. FACTS devices can influence the performance of existing protective system components (specifically distance relays) due to the fact that FACTS change power system quantities such as line impedances, voltages, and currents. Distance relay may mal-operate when FACTS devices are connected since they cause some of the tripping characteristics to change. This thesis investigates the impact on distance relay performance due to compensations using two types of FACTS controllers: Static Synchronous Compensator (STATCOM) and Static Synchronous Series Compensator (SSSC). Analytical study …

A Microscopic Simulation Approach To Performance Evaluation Of Intelligent Transportation System Corridors: A Case In Michigan, Matthew Levi Clark

Masters Theses

A cost and benefit evaluation of the Michigan Department of Transportation’s (MDOT) Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) is performed through integration of analytical techniques and microscopic traffic microsimulation. Observed freeway corridor incident logs and characteristics are studied to determine representative incident management patterns on choice study corridors. The Quadstone Paramics microsimulation traffic package is used to model the selected corridors during various analysis scenarios and investigate the effects of ITS on freeway incident management performance.

Design And Analysis Of Speed Control Using Hybrid Pid-Fuzzy Controller For Induction Motors, Ahmed Fattah

Masters Theses

This thesis presents a hybrid PID-Fuzzy control system for the speed control of a three-phase squirrel cage induction motor. The proposed method incorporates fuzzy logic and conventional controllers with utilization of vector control technique. This method combines the advantages of fuzzy logic controller and conventional controllers to improve the speed response of the induction motor. The design of fuzzy system consists of 9 fuzzy variables and 49 IF-THEN rules that define the behavior of the system. The FLC observes the loop error signal and correspondingly control the PID input error signal so that the actual speed signal matches the reference …

Wind Oscillator For Power Genration, Rs Vewen Ramasamy

Masters Theses

This thesis describes in detail the design, mechanical, electrical and software considerations in developing a working model for the non-conventional wind power converter called Wind Oscillator. This was based on the concept developed and patented by Tianshu Liu in the paper “Wind Oscillator and Rotor for Power Generation”[1]. In order to verify the practicality of this idea, a working model of the Wind Oscillator was designed, built and tested in the Western Michigan University wind tunnel facility. LabVIEW data acquisition and photogrammetry was performed on the model so as to evaluate the power generated by the Wind Oscillator and to …

Computer Simulations Of Propulsion Of Self-Propelled Flexible Nanobody, Ye Luo

Masters Theses

Swimming bodies such as flagellum and fishes are found everywhere in liquid environment. The research of simulation of swimmers is one of the most important branches among the field of biophysics. This study focus on the direct computer simulation of self-propelled flexible nanobody in fluid field. Two new objectives is studied based on the previous research of Tai-hsien Wu and Dewei ai (2014)[1]. ln Wu's article, the front end of micro swimming body is fixed and the migration of swimmers is neglected. For a further study, one of new targets is to release the head in 3-D simulation fluid area. …

Fragility Assessment Of High-Rise Reinforced Concrete Buildings, Hezha Sadraddin

Masters Theses

This research presents a probabilistic seismic responses analysis of high-rise reinforced concrete (RC) buildings using fragility assessment method. Three RC buildings, having the same plan dimension and height (12 story each) but different in structural configurations, were designed and their seismic responses were compared. First building is a Moment Resisting Frame (MRF), second is a MRF with exterior shear walls, and the third building consists most shear walls. Buildings were designed for high-seismic activity zone (i.e. Los Anglos) using the Equivalent Lateral Force (ELF) for seismic loading calculation. Sixteen real ground motion pairs were selected and scaled, then applied orthogonally …

Performance Analysis Of Magnetic Indoor Local Positioning System, Kyle Wroble

Masters Theses

As of the writing of this paper, there is no standard technique for implementing Indoor Position Systems (IPS) in one building or another, as each technique has its own advantages and drawbacks. The best IPS implementations often employ the use of multiple techniques within a building in order to maximize precision. This paper explores the most popular IPS techniques in use today, and highlights their strengths and weaknesses. After analyzing the pros and cons of each approach, it becomes clear that magnetic positioning is a useful tool for creating an accurate, reliable positioning system. Throughout this paper, the feasibility of …

Loss On Ignition Using Infrared Heating, Benjamin J. Binoniemi

Masters Theses

The focus of this study is a proof of concept that infrared heating can be used to produce a reliable and rapid method of performing the loss on ignition test. The loss on ignition test is a foundry industry standard test that requires all moisture and volatile organic compounds be vaporized from a sample of foundry sand. The standard test as recommended by the American Foundry Society uses a muffle oven and requires nearly four hours to perform. This new concept performs the same test in approximately ten minutes. The biggest issues with the loss on ignition test are time …

Hybrid Fuzzy-Pid Controller For Buck-Boost Converter In Solar Energy-Battery Systems, Karime Farhood Hussein

Masters Theses

In the present work, we propose a hybrid fuzzy PID control system to prevent overshoot and oscillations in DC-DC buck-boost converter for solar-battery system. We design and simulate a PID, a Fuzzy logic controller, and hybrid fuzzy PID control system to stabilize the output voltage of the buck-boost converter. The performance results using dynamic response of all of these controllers in terms of rise time, overshoot, peak time, and voltage oscillation are presented. The simulation results support the validity and advantages of the hybrid method.