Engineering Commons^™

Numerical Study Of Advanced Solar Receiver Tubes Based On A Coupled Thermo-Mechanical Analysis For Concentrated Solar Power Tower Plant, Shawn Michael Hatcher

Theses and Dissertations

The search for more sustainable energy to match the growing energy demand begins with finding more dispatchable resources such as solar energy. As one of the promising solar technologies, concentrated solar power (CSP) has a full capacity to store thermal energy for extended operation. Nevertheless, some key components in CSP systems usually face extreme environment, such as uneven solar flux, cyclic thermal expansion, structural degradation on the solar absorber tubes in a Concentrated Solar Power Tower (CSPT) Plant. In this study, we applied Multiphysics simulation to explore the benefits of introducing optimized fins for heat transfer enhancement and uniform temperature …

Evaluation For Using Expended Bioelectrochemical Systems As Soil Amendments For Improved Corn Plant Growth And A Drought Resistant Soil., Jackson Lee Sauers

Theses and Dissertations

A long-held practice is to mix agricultural soil with a soil amendment to improve growing conditions in crops. A common soil amendment is biosolids produced from both municipal and dairy wastewater due to the macro- and micronutrients within it. Both the agricultural and wastewater industries are participating in the Circular Economy concept (CEC). Two experiments explored using expended bioelectrochemical systems (BES) that treated either synthetic dairy wastewater (DWW) or synthetic municipal wastewater (SWW) as soil amendments to improve corn plant growth when treated with three different nutrient treatments: 100%- 50%- and 0% Hoagland Nutrient Solutions. Biochar and used terracotta clay …

Additively Manufactured Lenses For Modulating Guided Waves In Laminated Composites, Hajar Righi

Theses and Dissertations

Composite materials have increasingly been used as an alternative to metals and other isotropic materials for primary structural components in aerospace industries. Unlike traditional isotropic materials, composite materials are known to have complex internal microstructures. Therefore, it is essential to develop methods for the inspection, evaluation, and monitoring of composite materials. Ultrasonic-guided waves and, more precisely, Lamb waves have proven to be an efficient and accurate technique for the non-destructive testing. Since guided waves are dispersive and multimodal, it is important to develop a practical method to manipulate Lamb waves to achieve better structural health monitoring and non-destructive inspection results. …

Practical Requirements Elicitation In Modern Product Development: A Multi-Case Study In Discontinuous Innovation, Michael King

Theses and Dissertations

Practical modern product development, specifically rapid, lean efforts to create new disrupting or specialized products, face constraints that require modified requirements elicitation (RE) techniques. Requirements elicitation conventions have not been updated to address the challenges of these approaches, and industry practitioners lack the tools to select the most efficient techniques. This study examines the RE approaches performed by three resource-limited teams conducting discontinuous new product development through a multi-case study to identify gaps between the literature and practice, with suggestions to fill them. Our findings suggest modern RE practices and challenges closely reflect those found by studies on RE in …

Oxidized Fibrin Alginate Microbeads To Treat Vascular Calcification, Brittany Nichole Macha

Theses and Dissertations

Calcification is linked to a high prevalence of cardiovascular events and mortality due to arterial stiffness. Stiffening of the arteries in the case of medial calcification is due to hydroxyapatite mineral deposited in the artery thus leading to the loss of elastin. A possibility of removing this rogue mineral along the vessel walls could be the use of osteoclasts. Osteoclasts, a type of osteocyte, have the unique ability to absorb bone in the bone turnover process. It is proposed that in the future, osteoclasts be delivered to the site of mineralization through oxidized alginate-fibrin microbeads. Alginate hydrogels have proven great …

Quasi 1d Modelling Of A Scramjet Engine Cycle Using Heiser-Pratt Approach, Asmaa Chakir

Theses and Dissertations

Scramjet engines are key for sustained hypersonic flights. Analytic models play a critical role in the preliminary design of a scramjet engine configuration. The objective of this research is to develop and validate a quasi-1D model for the scramjet engine encompassing inlet, isolator and combustor, to evaluate the impact of flight conditions and design parameters on the engine functionality. The model is developed assuming isentropic flow in the inlet with a single turn; modified Fanno-flow equations in the isolator that account for the area change of the core flow; and the combustor is modeled using Heiser-Pratt equations accounting for the …

Structure And Dynamics Of Lignin In Condensed Phase For Biomass Conversion, Nusrat Jahan

Theses and Dissertations

Lignocellulosic biomass represents the largest potential volume and lowest cost for biofuel and biochemical production. Harnessing the full potential of the lignocellulosic biomass for low-carbon energy requires the knowledge of efficient breakdown and fractionation of its carbohydrates and lignin. Organic solvent pretreatment is recognized as an emerging way ahead because of its inherent advantages, such as the ability to fractionate lignocellulosic biomass into cellulose, lignin, and hemicellulose components with high purity, as well as easy solvent recovery and solvent reuse. Through all-atom MD simulation, we analyze the conformational transition of diverse lignin molecules in varying concentration of Methanol/water , DMSO/water …

A Constitutive Material Model For Simulating Texture Evolution And Anisotropy Effects In Cold Spray., Creston Michael Giles

Theses and Dissertations

Cold spray has seen rapid advancement since its inception and has shown significant potential as a method of additive manufacturing. However, the large plastic deformation and repeated heating/cooling cycles that the material undergoes during the cold spray process can result in gradients in material structure and large residual stresses. The purpose of this study is to extend the existing EMMI material model to include anisotropic material response through the use of orientation distribution functions to predict residual stresses and anisotropy resulting from cold spray and similar additive manufacturing processes. Through the use of a finite element simulation, yield surfaces for …

Development Of A Crosslinked Osteochondral Xenograft And A Collagen Stabilizing Intra-Articular Injection To Remediate Cartilage Focal Lesions To Prevent Osteoarthritis, Mark Lewis Mosher

Theses and Dissertations

Osteoarthritis is one of the most common causes of disability in adults in America. It is a progressive and degenerative disease where the articular cartilage is broken down and lost from the surfaces of bones causing chronic pain and swelling in the joints, and currently has no cure. The most commonly osteoarthritis starts from a focal lesion on the cartilage surface, which will expand on the surface and downwards through the thickness of the tissue. The current gold standard for correcting cartilage focal lesions is the osteochondral autograft/allograft transplantation (OAT), which replaces the defect with a fresh osteochondral graft. The …

Congestion Based Truck Drone Intermodal Delivery Optimization, Ankith Thodupunoori

Theses and Dissertations

Commerce companies have experienced a rise in the number of parcels that need to be delivered each day. The goal of this study is to provide a decision-making procedure to assist carriers in taking a more significant role in selecting cost and risk-efficient truck-drone intermodal delivery routing plan. The congestion-based model is developed to select the method of parcel delivery utilizing a truck and a drone for optimizing cost and time. A study also has been conducted to compare drone-only and truck-only delivery routing plan. The proposed A* Heuristic algorithm and the OSRM application generate the travel path for drone …

Design, Development And Evaluation Of The Ruggedized Edge Computing Node (Recon), Sahil Girin Patel

Theses and Dissertations

The increased quality and quantity of sensors provide an ever-increasing capability to collect large quantities of high-quality data in the field. Research devoted to translating that data is progressing rapidly; however, translating field data into usable information can require high performance computing capabilities. While high performance computing (HPC) resources are available in centralized facilities, bandwidth, latency, security and other limitations inherent to edge location in field sensor applications may prevent HPC resources from being used in a timely fashion necessary for potential United States Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) field applications. To address these limitations, the design requirements for RECON …

Towards Structured Planning And Learning At The State Fisheries Agency Scale, Caleb A. Aldridge

Theses and Dissertations

Inland recreational fisheries has grown philosophically and scientifically to consider economic and sociopolitical aspects (non-biological) in addition to the biological. However, integrating biological and non-biological aspects of inland fisheries has been challenging. Thus, an opportunity exists to develop approaches and tools which operationalize planning and decision-making processes which include biological and non-biological aspects of a fishery. This dissertation expands the idea that a core set of goals and objectives is shared among and within inland fisheries agencies; that many routine operations of inland fisheries managers can be regimented or standardized; and the novel concept that current information and operations can …

Stable Numerical Methodology For Variational Inequalities With Application In Quantitative Finance And Computational Mechanics, Davood Damircheli

Theses and Dissertations

Coercivity is a characteristic property of the bilinear term in a weak form of a partial differential equation in both infinite space and the corresponding finite space utilized by a numerical scheme. This concept implies \textit{stability} and \textit{well-posedness} of the weak form in both the exact solution and the numerical solution. In fact, the loss of this property especially in finite dimension cases leads to instability of the numerical scheme. This phenomenon occurs in three major families of problems consisting of advection-diffusion equation with dominant advection term, elastic analysis of very thin beams, and associated plasticity and non-associated plasticity problems. …

Comparing Importance Of Knowledge And Professional Skill Areas For Engineering Programming Utilizing A Two Group Delphi Survey, John F. Hutton

Theses and Dissertations

All engineering careers require some level of programming proficiency. However, beginning programming classes are challenging for many students. Difficulties have been well-documented and contribute to high drop-out rates which prevent students from pursuing engineering. While many approaches have been tried to improve the performance of students and reduce the dropout rate, continued work is needed. This research seeks to re-examine what items are critical for programming education and how those might inform what is taught in introductory programming classes (CS1). Following trends coming from accreditation and academic boards on the importance of professional skills, we desire to rank knowledge and …

Development Of Alternative Air Filtration Materials And Methods Of Analysis, Ivan Philip Beckman

Theses and Dissertations

Clean air is a global health concern. Each year more than seven million people across the globe perish from breathing poor quality air. Development of high efficiency particulate air (HEPA) filters demonstrate an effort to mitigate dangerous aerosol hazards at the point of production. The nuclear power industry installs HEPA filters as a final line of containment of hazardous particles. Advancement air filtration technology is paramount to achieving global clean air. An exploration of analytical, experimental, computational, and machine learning models is presented in this dissertation to advance the science of air filtration technology. This dissertation studies, develops, and analyzes …

Inequity Of Access Across America: A Spatial, Temporal, And Modal Disparity Analysis, Sanju Maharjan

Theses and Dissertations

The overarching goal of this dissertation is to examine the spatial, temporal, and modal disparity of access across America. This is achieved by posing three research objectives. The first objective determines the spatial and temporal disparity of transit and automobile access gap, its impact on transit use, and its socioeconomic and built environment correlates. The second objective examines the spatial and temporal disparity of slightly and extremely risky bike infrastructure and measures the social inequity of access to bike infrastructure. The third objective indicates spatial transit access mismatch between high- and low-wage employment across metropolitans. Three findings are discerned. First, …

Recruiting More U.S. Women Into Engineering Based On Stories From Morocco: A Qualitative Study, Soundouss Sassi

Theses and Dissertations

The objective of this project is to examine the differences between Moroccan and American students with regards to the cultural influences that led them to pursue an engineering degree. Annually since 2015, a partnership between a university in Morocco and MSU allows senior engineering Moroccan students to study at MSU to obtain their graduate degree in aerospace or mechanical engineering. The roughly equal gender representation in most Moroccan cohorts prompted our research question: “How do students from Morocco and the United States describe the cultural reasons that factored into their choice to pursue an engineering degree?” This exploratory qualitative study …

Molecular Dynamics Of High Temperature Hydrogen Attack, Mike Travis Bodden Connor

Theses and Dissertations

High temperature hydrogen attack (HTHA) is a damage mechanism that only affects carbon steel and low alloy material. Most of the data regarding HTHA are experimental-driven. Even though this approach has been successful, there are still much more things that the oil and gas industry does not understand about HTHA. The regions that were considered safe (below the Nelson curves) have experienced catastrophic failure. Our research consists of performing Molecular Dynamics (MD) and the Nudge Elastic Band (NEB) calculation of HTHA to better understand the atomistic behavior of this damage mechanism.

Resiliency Of Levee-Protected Power Networks To Flooding In A Changing Climate Integrating Environmental Justice, Seyed Saeed Miraee-Ashtiani

Theses and Dissertations

Electric power system (EPS) is an integral part of infrastructure systems. Ensuring its resiliency to extreme weather events and natural hazards is crucial to protect the safety, economy and public health. Recorded and projected data show an increase in the frequency and severity of extreme weather events and natural hazards attributed to a changing climate. It is critical to ensure the integrity of the aging infrastructure systems and to promote environmental justice by shrinking the energy-equity gap to lower power outages in disadvantaged communities.

An important aspect is the resiliency interdependency of EPS to other critical infrastructure systems, an aspect …

Developing An Early Life Cycle Manufacturability Assessment For Conceptual Designs, Tonya Gamblin Mccall

Theses and Dissertations

Studies have shown that 70 – 80% of a product's life cycle costs are committed by the end of the product design phase (Anderson, 2014; National Research Council, 1991; Swift, 1987). This supports the general claim that decision making in the conceptual stage drives the cost throughout the life cycle. The use of concurrent engineering has been viewed as the answer to this problem, offering the Design for Excellence (DFX) as one approach for evaluating product designs across specific disciplines. This research focuses on a subset of DFX referred to as Design for Manufacturability to develop a means to assess …

Assessment Of Simulated And Real-World Autonomy Performance With Small-Scale Unmanned Ground Vehicles, William Peyton Johnson

Theses and Dissertations

Off-road autonomy is a challenging topic that requires robust systems to both understand and navigate complex environments. While on-road autonomy has seen a major expansion in recent years in the consumer space, off-road systems are mostly relegated to niche applications. However, these applications can provide safety and navigation to dangerous areas that are the most suited for autonomy tasks. Traversability analysis is at the core of many of the algorithms employed in these topics. In this thesis, a Clearpath Robotics Jackal vehicle is equipped with a 3D Ouster laser scanner to define and traverse off-road environments. The Mississippi State University …

Behavioral And Histological Inflammatory Analysis Of A Single, Mild Traumatic Brain Injury And Repeated Subconcussive Brain Injury Using A Rodent Model., Anna Marie Clay

Theses and Dissertations

Subconcussive (SC) impacts have become a growing concern within the neuroscience community regarding the immediate and long-lasting effects of sports-related injuries. While a single low-level impact, i.e., a subconcussion, may not cause cerebral perturbations, it has been increasingly recognized that repeated SC exposure can induce deleterious effects. Therefore, determining the lower limits of systematic perturbation resulting from multiple SC impacts is of critical importance in expanding our understanding of cerebral vulnerability and recovery. Currently, there is a lack of correlation between a mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) and repeated SC impacts with respect to injury biomechanics. Moreover, the cumulative threshold …

Perceived Location Of Virtual Content Measurement Method In Optical See Through Augmented Reality, Farzana Alam Khan

Theses and Dissertations

An important research question for optical see through AR is, “how accurately and precisely can a virtual object’s perceived location be measured in three dimensional space?” Previously, a method was developed for measuring the perceived 3D location of virtual objects using Microsoft HoloLens1 display. This study found an unexplained rightward perceptual bias on horizontal plane; most participants were right eye dominant, and consistent with the hypothesis that perceived location is biased in eye dominance direction. In this thesis, a replication study is reported, which includes binocular and monocular viewing conditions, recruits an equal number of left and right eye dominant …

Three-Axis Magnetometer Calibration With Norm Preservation, Seth Lichlyter

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis proposes a set of methods for the purpose of improving the calibration of three-axis magnetometers. Specifically, these methods aim to improve the accuracy of the bias estimation methods currently in use. The first proposed method utilizes a constrained optimization problem based on norm preserving. The second proposed method finds the same bias estimate as the first method, but in a computationally more efficient manner. The last proposed method tackles the case where the value of the local geomagnetic field is only imprecisely known. Computer simulations demonstrate the viability of the proposed methods.

Short-Term Electricity Price Point And Probabilistic Forecasts, Chenxu Zhang

Theses and Dissertations

Accurate short-term electricity price forecasts are essential to all electricity market participants. Generation companies adopt price forecasts to hedge generation shortage risks; load serving entities use price forecasts to purchase energy with low cost; and trading companies utilize price forecasts to arbitrage between markets.

Currently, researches on point forecast mainly focus on exploring periodic patterns of electricity price in time domain. However, frequency domain enables us to identify more information within price data to facilitate forecast. Besides, price spike forecast has not been fully studied in the existing works. Therefore, we propose a short-term electricity price forecast framework that analyzes …

Effects Of Cyclic Intercritical Annealing On Strength-Ductility Combinations In Medium Manganese Steels, Dawn Van Iderstine

Theses and Dissertations

Intercritically annealed medium manganese steels are a promising third-generation advanced high-strength steel candidate, relying on large fractions of Mn-enriched retained austenite for excellent strength-ductility combinations. The present study proposes a novel cyclic intercritical annealing to promote nucleation and efficient stabilization of austenite in a medium Mn microstructure. Design of the heat treatment is driven by the hypothesis that the distribution of ductile austenite is key in mitigating the strain incompatibility that accelerates failure in these steels. Development and preliminary testing of the heat treatment are first detailed and compared with literature results for equivalent isothermal annealing. The effects of cyclic …

Three Case Studies Of Using Hybrid Model Machine Learning Techniques In Educational Data Mining To Improve The Classification Accuracies, Sujan Poudyal

Theses and Dissertations

A multitude of data is being produced from the increase in instructional technology, e-learning resources, and online courses. This data could be used by educators to analyze and extract useful information which could be beneficial to both instructors and students. Educational Data Mining (EDM) extracts hidden information from data contained within the educational domain. In data mining, hybrid method is the combination of various machine learning techniques. Through this dissertation, the novel use of machine learning hybrid techniques was explored in EDM using three educational case studies. First, in consideration for the importance of students’ attention, on and off-task data …

A Biomechanical Approach To Prevent Falls In Ergonomic Settings, Sachini Kodithuwakku Arachchige

Theses and Dissertations

Introduction: Fall-related injuries are exceptionally prevalent in occupational settings. While endangering the workers’ health, falls cause poor productivity and increased economic burden in the workplace. Hence, identifying these threats and training workers to achieve proper postural control is crucial. Purpose: Study 1: To investigate the ankle joint kinematics in unexpected and expected trip responses during single-tasking (ST), dual-tasking (DT), and triple-tasking (TT), before and after a physically fatiguing exercise. Study 2: To investigate the impact of virtual heights, DT, and training on static postural stability and cognitive processing. Methods: Study 1: Twenty collegiate volunteers (10 males and females, one left …

Experimental Study On Co2-Sensitive Polyacrylamide As Potential In-Situ Sealing Agent For Co2 Leakage Pathways In Geological Storage Sites, Iris Laihmen Quan Lopez

Theses and Dissertations

As the world pushes for ‘greener’ technologies and carbon neutrality, efforts have focused on creating novel ways to mitigate humankind’s carbon footprint. Carbon capture and storage (CCS) has become a prevalent technique that has proven to be an effective long-term method to safely relocate excess carbon dioxide (CO₂) into subsurface formations. However, CCS is a newer technique which requires constant monitoring due to potential leakage pathways present in CO₂ storage sites; therefore, a preventive approach to seal leakage pathways is recommended. This dissertation explores the potential of CO₂-sensitive polyacrylamide (CO₂-SPAM) as a novel …

Ferrous Alloy Manufacturing For The Martian Surface Through In-Situ Resource Utilization With Ionic Liquids Harvested Iron And Bosch Process Carbon, Blake C. Stewart

Theses and Dissertations

As research continues for the habitation of the Lunar and Martian surfaces, the need for materials for construction of structural parts, mechanical components, and tools remains as a major milestone. The use of in-situ resource utilization (ISRU) techniques is critical due to the financial, physical, and logistical burdens of sending supplies beyond low-Earth orbit. The Bosch process is currently in development as a life support system at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) to regenerate oxygen (O2) from metabolic carbon dioxide (CO2) with the byproduct of elemental carbon (C). The Bosch process presents a …