Engineering Commons^™

Design And Plan Of A Modified Hydroponic Shipping Container For Research, John A. Houtman

Open Access Theses

As the world’s population continues to increase, food production will need to increase in order to meet the predicted rise in food demand. However, with increased pressure on cropland available from environmental effects and urbanization, new innovative methods of crop production need to be researched in order to increase agricultural production with limited land. This research focuses on the design of a single form of urban agriculture that is considered Zfarming and has the potential to produce quality urban agricultural produce through ground-based measures. This project produced detailed step-by-step analysis of the design process, develop variability within the modified hydroponic …

Mathematical Analysis Of Feedback Targets Of Bmp Signaling In Drosophila Embryonic Development, Yan Luo

Open Access Theses

Bone morphogenetic proteins (BMPs) drive a range of cellular processes especially in the early stages of embryonic development. This family of proteins acts as one of the most important extracellular signals in development pattern formation across the animal kingdom. Cells in embryos differentiate into different cell types in response to the concentration level of BMP. This complex process is regulated by multiple regulators that serve to tune the signal response.

Extensive experimental and computational research has been performed to analyze BMP regulation in Drosophila, a widely studied model organism, and has advanced our understanding of animal development. Because of …

Mapping And Analyzing Energy Use And Efficiency In A Modified Hydroponic Shipping Container, Rachel E. Sparks

Open Access Theses

In urban centers today, vertical farming is becoming a popular alternative to conventional agriculture in an effort to increase local food production and improve urban food security by growing crops using hydroponic methods in controlled environment spaces. More specifically, one vertical method involves growing crops inside refurbished shipping containers, or a “farm-in-a-box” concept, which offers a flexible, mobile, and scalable means of year-round food production in a variety of climates. Despite benefits of producing food locally, some of the concerns associated with these vertical farming systems include high energy consumption from climate control and electric lighting systems as well as …

Consonant Discrimination In The Inferior Colliculus Of Young And Aged Rats, Christopher S. Soverns

Open Access Theses

Complex acoustic stimuli are thoroughly encoded and processed along the primary auditory pathway to give reliable and relevant information about the environment, and elucidating the neural coding mechanisms is essential to informing clinical attempts to combat auditory dysfuntion. Receiving a uniquely diverse set of ascending and descending inputs, the inferior colliculus (IC) is a site of intricate temporal processing. In this work, natural and modified human speech is used to investigate discrimination of voice onset time (VOT) in the spiking output of IC neurons. A template-matching classification model is proposed in which single stimulus presentation responses are correlated with aggregate …

Using Energy-Efficient Technologies To Produce Bedding Plants And Microgreens In Protected And Controlled Environments, Joshua R. Gerovac

Open Access Theses

Gerovac, Joshua R. M.S., Purdue University, December 2014. Using Energy-Efficient Technologies to Produce Bedding Plants and Microgreens in Protected and Controlled Environments. Major Professor: Roberto G. Lopez. Production of bedding plants in commercial greenhouses (GHs) located in northern latitudes begins in late winter and continues through late spring when low outdoor temperatures generally necessitate active heating to maintain temperatures suitable for growth and development. Meanwhile, year-round production of microgreens using multi-layer systems requires sole-source (SS) photosynthetic lighting for production. Energy used to provide active heating in commercial GHs or SS lighting in multi-layer systems is second only to labor as …

Particle Swarm Optimization Using Multiple Neighborhood Connectivity And Winner Take All Activation Applied To Biophysical Models Of Inferior Colliculus Neurons, Brandon S. Coventry

Open Access Theses

Age-related hearing loss is a prevalent neurological disorder, affecting as many as 63% of adults over the age of 70. The inability to hear and understand speech is a cause of much distress in aged individuals and is becoming a major public health concern as age-related hearing loss has also been correlated with other neurological disorders such as Alzheimer's dementia. The Inferior Colliculus (IC) is a major integrative auditory center, receiving excitatory and inhibitory inputs from several brainstem nuclei. This complex balance of excitation and inhibition gives rise to complex neural responses, which are measured in terms of firing rate …

Quality Changes In Hermetically Stored Corn Caused By Fungi And Sitophilus Zeamais, Nda-Agyima Addae-Mensah K

Open Access Theses

Hermetic storage has been shown to be effective in controlling insect pests and maintaining grain quality of dry grains at 13% moisture and below. However, the feasibility and use of hermetic storage for grains at intermediate mid-moisture levels under the influence of the sub-Saharan African weather conditions is relatively unknown. Hermetic storage experiments were conducted on grade 1 "6297 and 6333 VT RIB" hybrid corn under controlled temperature conditions at 10 degrees centigrade and 25 degrees centigrade at target approximate moisture content levels of 11, 15, 18 and 21% wet basis for a total storage period of 6 months. Corn …

A Novel Three Degree-Of-Freedoms Oscillation System Of Insect Flapping Wings, Yi Qin

Open Access Theses

We propose an oscillation system to replicate the dynamic behavior of flapping wings, inspired by insect flight muscles. In particular, we study the flight of the fruit fly Drosophila virilis . We model the wing as a rigid body with three degree-of-freedom, described by three Euler angles: the stroke angle, the rotation angle and the deviation angle. Insect flight muscles are separated into two types: power muscles and control muscles. One actuator and one torsional spring at the stroke angle act as the power muscles. Two torsional springs at the rotation angle and the deviation angle mimic the control muscles. …

Modulation Of Cell-Matrix Interaction For Cryopreservation Of Engineered Tissue, Angela Christine Seawright

Open Access Theses

Long term preservation of functional engineered tissues can significantly advance tissue engineering industry and regenerative medicine. Several preservation techniques have been proposed and investigated for this purpose, and cryopreservation is a leading candidate. While tissues are cryopreserved, ice forms in both the extracellular and intracellular spaces and causes freezing-induced spatiotemporal deformation of the tissue. During this process the cells undergo dehydration by the freezing-induced osmotic pressure difference and mechanical deformation, transmitted through cell-extracellular matrix adhesions. However, the significance and interaction of these cellular level transport and mechanics processes are not well understood. Therefore, this study aims to establish mechanistic understanding …