Digital Commons Network^™

Simulating Information And Communication Applications In Employee Interaction Network Models, Matthew Kanter

Student Research Submissions

Information and communication technology (ICT) use has been identified throughout its development and evolution with the Internet boom as a net positive tool for most employees and organizations in the working world. Only recently have studies regarding employees’ well-being begun to come to the forefront of research regarding these rapidly evolving technologies, however these are important issues to discuss in the context of work-life boundary management, emotional exhaustion, overwhelming stress levels, and moral disengagement among other employee well-being dimensions. To explore how employees’ well being might be influenced by ICT use, this study conducted a quantitative survey and analyzed a …

The Analysis Of Mechanical Exfoliation Of Graphene For Various Fabrication And Automation Techniques, Lance Yarbrough

Mechanical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Mechanical Exfoliation of Graphene is an often-overlooked portion of the fabrication of quantum devices, and to create more devices quickly, optimizing this process to generate better flakes is critical. In addition, it would be valuable to simulate test pulls quickly, to gain insight on flake quality of various materials and exfoliation conditions. Physical pulls of graphene at various temperatures, pull forces, and pull repetitions were analyzed and compared to the results of ANSYS simulations, solved for similar results. Using ANSYS’ ability to predict trends in exfoliations, flake thickness and coverage using stress and deflection analyses were investigated. Generally, both strongly …

Integrating Galectin-3 Into A Computational Model Of Cardiac Fibrosis Progression, Adam Pieratt

Chemical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Cardiac fibrosis, a large contributor to heart failure, is the excessive accumulation of extracellular matrix in response to stress or injury. There are no approved treatments for cardiac fibrosis, and targeting specific species involved creates complex problems for drug development, so a computational model of the cardiac fibroblast signaling network can be used to observe the interactions involved in the progression of cardiac fibrosis. In this paper, a new protein called galectin-3 is integrated into this existing model, and connections are established to expand the coverage of the network. The additions are described, simulated using Netflux biological system simulation software, …

Comparing North American Professional Sports League Season Formats Using Monte Carlo Simulation, Lathan Gregg

Industrial Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Each NFL, NBA, and MLB season consists of a regular season, in which teams play a set number of scheduled games and a playoff, in which qualifying teams compete for a championship. At the conclusion of each season, teams are ranked based on their performance throughout the season. This study aims to investigate the ability of each league's season format to accurately rank teams using Monte Carlo simulation. Matches between two teams are simulated by using the team’s assigned strength ranks to calculate a winning probability for each team. The winning probabilities are simulated with different skill values, dictating how …

Evacuation Of Students With Intellectual Disability In Building Fires: A Three-Part Methodology, Haley Hostetter

All Dissertations

People with disabilities are one of the most vulnerable groups in building fires. Despite this, they have traditionally been overlooked by fire evacuation researchers. This is perhaps the most alarming for the group with Intellectual Disability when given their present statistics for fire involvement, injuries, and death. Annually, people with mental disabilities are involved in 1700 home fires, resulting in 39 fatalities and 122 injuries per 1000 fires. Additionally, 40% of these fires were started intentionally by people with mental disabilities. When combined with their high fire risk, the lack of evacuation research focused on people with Intellectual Disability shows …

Novel Vector Assignment Approach For Inherent Strain Modeling Of Laser Powder Bed Fusion Manufacturing, Lucas M. Morand

All Dissertations

The expansion of the design space due to additive manufacturing (AM) has been a large motivator for the success of this family of processes. Despite the complexity of the physics in metal laser powder bed fusion AM causing significant stresses and strains in finished parts, the design advantages and subsequent performance improvements continue to drive the expansion of AM. Because the trial-and-error approach to AM part development is cost prohibitive, simulation of prints has become crucial. However, full thermo-mechanical simulation is susceptible to the same pitfall of time and computational cost in order to attain part-scale results. The development of …

The Advancement Of Experimental And Computation Tools For The Study Of Molten Salt Chemistry To Facilitate The Extraction Of Strategic Elements In Nuclear Applications, Michael Stoddard

Theses and Dissertations

Nuclear energy presents environmental benefits, yet the challenge of radioactive waste management persists. Advanced solutions, such as Molten Salt Reactors (MSRs), require a more profound understanding of molten salt chemistry. This research aims to develop tools, including a depletion simulator, molten salt electrochemical simulator, and a fluoride-based thermodynamic reference electrode for electrochemical purification. The computationally inexpensive depletion simulator allows for exploration into extraction and processing strategies for molten salt reactors. An illustrative case study on Mo-99 production from MSRs demonstrates the practical application of the theoretical framework, emphasizing the need for optimization in extraction effectiveness and separation difficulty. The electrochemical …

Optimization Of Human Interactions In The College Campus Model Via Simio Integration, Benjamin E. Chaback

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

College campuses are a significant part of life in some cities. Many students each year attend university, pursuing additional knowledge from faculty members. Both staff and faculty members rely on these students to have successful jobs and to ensure the university functions. Yet recently, more and more students are attending, leading to overcrowding, lower admission rates, and difficulty getting into good programs. Previous work exists on qualitative student affairs and quantitative retention data, yet little on using simulations to model this problem. This work aimed to (a) Determine the ability to successfully model human interactions/people flow on a college campus, …

Adaptive Control Of An Aeroelastic System For Active Flutter Suppression And Disturbance Rejection, Patrick Sterling Downs

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The future of aircraft design strives for lighter weight, more aerodynamically efficient structures. These improvements may come with the drawback of increased structural flexibility and elevated aeroelastic effects, often resulting in a lower flutter speed. This motivates the implementation of advanced control methods to control aeroelastic systems over a range of flight conditions, suppress and delay the onset of flutter, and compensate for disturbances, actuator dynamics, and unmodeled nonlinear dynamics.

This dissertation first develops a novel method for constructing time-domain simulation models of two and three-dimensional aeroelastic systems, resulting in models that are suitable for the implementation of state-space control …

Performance Analysis Of Mobile Edge Computing Deployment Models In 5g Networks, Safaa Alali, Abdulkaim Assalem

Jerash for Research and Studies Journal مجلة جرش للبحوث والدراسات

5G networks and Mobile Edge Computing (MEC) are two main pillars of the next technological revolution. The first pillar provides ultra-reliable, high-bandwidth connectivity with ultra-low latency, while the second pillar gives mobile networks cloud computing capabilities at the edge of the network, enabling compute-dense, context-aware services for mobile users. So the next generation of mobile networks will see close integration between computing and communication. Therefore, it was necessary to study the different deployment options for edge hosts in 5G network, to know the effect of those options on the overall performance of the network. In this research, (Omnetpp 6.0) network …

A Fractal Art Approach To The Three-Body Problem, Charles F. Babbs

Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering Faculty Working Papers

This preliminary study explores a new search strategy for identifying relatively stable vs. unstable solutions to the planar three-body problem in astrophysics, starting from the perspective of computer-generated art. Here classical Newtonian accelerations, speeds, and positions of all three bodies in a fixed plane are calculated. All three bodies are stationary at time zero, and the fate of the system is classified as reflecting either a bound stable orbit, a likely collision, or the ejection of one body. The initial position of one of the three bodies is varied in the image plane, and the outcome coded as one of …

Strategy Optimization Method Of Multi-Dimension Projection Based On Deep Reinforcement Learning, Jing An, Guangya Si, Lei Zhang

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: Based on the perfect performance of deep reinforcement learning (DRL) in strategy optimization, this paper proposes a strategy optimization method of action taking the multi-dimension projection action as the main research object. The method combines the simulation experiment method with the DRL method. After analyzing the current situation of strategy optimization research, the deep learning framework is selected according to the research problems, and a DRL multi-dimension projection strategy model based on the asynchronous advantage actor-critic (A3C) algorithm is constructed. Through simulation experiments, the interactive learning between the DRL model and the simulation of "out of the loop" is …

Parametric Optimization Of Friction Stir Welding Of Aa6061-T6 Samples Using The Copper Donor Stir-Assisted Material Method, Aiman H. Al-Allaq, Joseph Maniscalco, Srinivasa Naik Bhukya, Zhenhua Wu, Abdelmageed Elmustafa

Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering Faculty Publications

This study presents an optimization of the process parameters for the effect of copper (Cu) donor material percentage on the friction stir welding (FSW) of AA6061-T6 alloy. Extensive factorial experiments were conducted to determine the significance of the rotational speed (ω), the transverse speed (v), the interface coefficient of friction (μ), and the Cu donor material percentage in the plunge, left, right, and downstream zones. Design Expert 13 software was used to identify the number of simulation experiments to be conducted using the Abaqus simulation software. From Design Expert 13, which is a thorough multi-objective optimization analysis software, we were …