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Full-Text Articles in Engineering

High Power Microwave Operational Exposure Detection Using Thermoacoustic Wave Generation In Lossy Dielectric Polymers, James J. Frey Sep 2022

High Power Microwave Operational Exposure Detection Using Thermoacoustic Wave Generation In Lossy Dielectric Polymers, James J. Frey

Theses and Dissertations

A feasibility analysis for the use of microwave-induced thermoacoustic (TA) wave generation in lossy dielectric media to detect pulsed high power microwave directed energy weapons in force health protection applications was conducted based on a series of empirical and computational investigations. A potential target volume material, carbon-loaded polytetrafluoroethylene, was identified for further study based on anticipated complex dielectric properties, with laboratory measurements of select electromagnetic (EM), thermal, and elastic material properties of relevance to the TA effect conducted to determine parameter values. A planar geometry TA-based signal chain model using thin film piezoelectric sensors was developed for both finite element …


Multichannel Blind Deconvolution Of Circularly Polarized Imagery, Patrick B. Cunningham Sep 2022

Multichannel Blind Deconvolution Of Circularly Polarized Imagery, Patrick B. Cunningham

Theses and Dissertations

Current methods can be used to recreate an expected Stokes polarization vector from measured light for characterization purposes. However, this only applies to three of the Stokes parameters, that is, the linear polarization components. Circular polarization is not currently being utilized for object characterization because the mathematical complexity is greater than for that of linear polarization. This research will analyze a way to expand existing algorithms to include circular polarization and enable the complete reconstruction of the Stokes vector from the measured light into a blind deconvolution algorithm for Stokes estimation and image reconstruction.


Development Of A Security-Focused Multi-Channel Communication Protocol And Associated Quality Of Secure Service (Qoss) Metrics, Paul M. Simon Sep 2022

Development Of A Security-Focused Multi-Channel Communication Protocol And Associated Quality Of Secure Service (Qoss) Metrics, Paul M. Simon

Theses and Dissertations

The threat of eavesdropping, and the challenge of recognizing and correcting for corrupted or suppressed information in communication systems is a consistent challenge. Effectively managing protection mechanisms requires an ability to accurately gauge the likelihood or severity of a threat, and adapt the security features available in a system to mitigate the threat. This research focuses on the design and development of a security-focused communication protocol at the session-layer based on a re-prioritized communication architecture model and associated metrics. From a probabilistic model that considers data leakage and data corruption as surrogates for breaches of confidentiality and integrity, a set …


Full Pattern Analysis And Comparison Of The Center Fed And Offset Fed Cassegrain Antennas With Large Focal Length To Diameter Ratios For High Power Microwave Transmission, Derek W. Mantzke Jun 2022

Full Pattern Analysis And Comparison Of The Center Fed And Offset Fed Cassegrain Antennas With Large Focal Length To Diameter Ratios For High Power Microwave Transmission, Derek W. Mantzke

Theses and Dissertations

High power microwaves (HPM) have been a topic of research since the Cold War era. This paper will present a comparison between two Cassegrain-type antennas: the axially, or center fed, and the offset fed. Specifically, the 10 GHz operating frequency will be investigated with large focal length to diameter () ratios. Beam patterns which encompass the entire radiation pattern will be included for data validation and optimization. The simulations will follow a design of experiments factorial model to ensure all possible combinations of prescribed parameters are included, including an analysis of variance (ANOVA) study to find parameter influence on the …


Theory And Design Of A Highly Compressed Dropped-Channel Polarimetric Synthetic Aperture Radar, John T. Becker Jun 2022

Theory And Design Of A Highly Compressed Dropped-Channel Polarimetric Synthetic Aperture Radar, John T. Becker

Theses and Dissertations

Compressed sensing (CS) is a recent mathematical technique that leverages the sparsity in certain sets of data to solve an underdetermined system and recover a full set of data from a sub-Nyquist set of measurements of the data. Given the size and sparsity of the data, radar has been a natural choice to apply compressed sensing to, typically in the fast-time and slow-time domains. Polarimetric synthetic aperture radar (PolSAR) generates a particularly large amount of data for a given scene; however, the data tends to be sparse. Recently a technique was developed to recover a dropped PolSAR channel by leveraging …


Effects Of Motion Measurement Errors On Radar Target Detection, Darnell D. Parker Jun 2022

Effects Of Motion Measurement Errors On Radar Target Detection, Darnell D. Parker

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis investigates the relationships present between signal-to-clutter ratios, motion measurement errors, image quality metrics, and the task of target detection, in order to discover what factor merit greater focus in order to attain the highest probability of target detection success. This investigation is accomplished by running a high number of Monte Carlo trials through a coherent target detector and analyzing the results. The aforementioned relationships are demonstrated via sample synthetic aperture radar imagery, histograms, receiver operating characteristics curves, and error bar plots.


Influence Of Materials And Design Parameters On Zinc Oxide Surface Acoustic Devices, Samuel B. Dewhitt Jun 2022

Influence Of Materials And Design Parameters On Zinc Oxide Surface Acoustic Devices, Samuel B. Dewhitt

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis presents research into Zinc Oxide (ZnO) based resonators to include Width Extensional Mode (WEM), Length Extensional Mode (LEM), and Surface Acoustic Wave (SAW) devices. The design and operation of ZnO based SAW devices are investigated further to characterize design parameters and operating modes. Their design, fabrication, and results are discussed in detail. SAW device testing in conjunction with X-Ray Diffractometry (XRD) and Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) are utilized to characterize ZnO and its deposition parameters on a variety of different substrates and interlayers, with different deposition temperatures and annealing parameters. These substrates include silicon, silicon oxide-on-silicon, and sapphire …


Methods For Focal Plane Array Resolution Estimation Using Random Laser Speckle In Non-Paraxial Geometries, Phillip J. Plummer Jun 2022

Methods For Focal Plane Array Resolution Estimation Using Random Laser Speckle In Non-Paraxial Geometries, Phillip J. Plummer

Theses and Dissertations

The infrared (IR) imaging community has a need for direct IR detector evaluation due to the continued demand for small pixel pitch detectors, the emergence of strained-layer-super-lattice devices, and the associated lateral carrier diffusion issues. Conventional laser speckle-based modulation transfer function (MTF) estimation is dependent on Fresnel propagation and a wide-sense-stationary input random process, limiting the use of this approach for lambda (wavelength)-scale IR devices. This dissertation develops two alternative methodologies for speckle-based resolution evaluation of IR focal plane arrays (FPAs). Both techniques are formulated using Rayleigh-Sommerfield electric field propagation, making them valid in the non-paraxial geometries dictated for resolution …


Polarization-Based Image Segmentation And Height Estimation For Interferometric Sar, Augusta J. Vande Hey Jun 2022

Polarization-Based Image Segmentation And Height Estimation For Interferometric Sar, Augusta J. Vande Hey

Theses and Dissertations

To find scatterers in a synthetic aperture radar (SAR) image, a modification is proposed to improve peak region segmentation (PRS) with region merging. The modification considers the polarization of each pixel before it is added to a segment to ensure the segment only contains pixels of the same polarization. Prior to region merging, the polarization of the segments is compared, so that only segments with the same polarization are merged into a single region. The segmented regions are used to find the height of each scatterer through interferometric SAR (IFSAR) processing. Multiple methods of IFSAR are examined to find the …


Uav Positioning Data Determined Via Aruco Tags For Aircraft Surface Inspection, Caleb B. Schmidt Mar 2022

Uav Positioning Data Determined Via Aruco Tags For Aircraft Surface Inspection, Caleb B. Schmidt

Theses and Dissertations

Aircraft are frequently inspected to ensure that military and civilian safety standards are adhered to. These inspections are performed pre- and post-flight and are currently performed by trained maintenance personnel. This work furthers the automation of aircraft surface inspection by using ArUco tags to determine the position of the UAV during aerial inspections. The ArUco tag based position data was then compared to a highly accurate infrared motion capture system to determine the viability of this for accurate positioning of the vehicle. This work includes flight experiments with two different UAVs to perform a system viability comparison.


Detection And Identification Of Cellphone Emitted Light Detection And Ranging Light In Security Camera Video Footage, Tristan V. Creek Mar 2022

Detection And Identification Of Cellphone Emitted Light Detection And Ranging Light In Security Camera Video Footage, Tristan V. Creek

Theses and Dissertations

The prevalence of Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) sensors in consumer cellphones has ushered in an era of access to technologies previously inaccessible to the average person. Although LiDAR sensors emit light in the infrared spectrum invisible to the naked eye, many security cameras possess the ability to capture infrared light reflected off surfaces to detect LiDAR light in an environment. Once detected and recorded to video footage, current classification methods fail to identify the LiDAR light. Therefore, this research develops a methodology to detect LiDAR light in security camera video footage and identify it as cellphone LiDAR. A proposed …


Relative Magnetic Position And Rotation Sensor Assisted Dual-Foot Pedestrian Dead Reckoning, Jenario Y. Johnson Mar 2022

Relative Magnetic Position And Rotation Sensor Assisted Dual-Foot Pedestrian Dead Reckoning, Jenario Y. Johnson

Theses and Dissertations

The use of wearable foot-based inertial measurement units (IMUs) incorporated in a navigation system can address the problem of single-person location tracking in situations and environments where GPS signals may be unavailable or inconsistent. This Pedestrian Dead Reckoning (PDR) approach enables standalone personal tracking. A notable solution involves using inertial measurement units (IMUs) in a filter to apply zero-velocity updates to a Kalman filter to get a position solution. This paper continues on the path of the former method by investigating the feasibility of PDR using a pair of low cost IMUs along with a pair of relative position and …


Magnetic Anomaly Absolute Positioning For Hypersonic Aircraft, Alexander J. Mcneil Mar 2022

Magnetic Anomaly Absolute Positioning For Hypersonic Aircraft, Alexander J. Mcneil

Theses and Dissertations

GPS has proven to be an extremely valuable asset for navigation, and timing. GPS has become the standard navigation system for all applications, but GPS has limitations. GPS is susceptible to jamming, spoofing, and in the case of hypersonic aircraft, is likely unavailable. When an aircraft is traveling at hypersonic speeds, there is a plasma sheath that surrounds the aircraft. This plasma sheath blocks electromagnetic waves, and is therefore responsible for a GPS blackout. GPS unavailability for hypersonic aircraft has prompted the research into the viability of alternate navigation systems for these aircraft. This paper seeks to explore the viability …


Applications Of A Lightning Proxy To Generate Synthetic Lightning For Use In Physics-Based Image-Chain Models, Bryan G. Castro Mar 2022

Applications Of A Lightning Proxy To Generate Synthetic Lightning For Use In Physics-Based Image-Chain Models, Bryan G. Castro

Theses and Dissertations

A method of generating synthetic lightning through the use of a convective available potential energy (CAPE) times precipitation rate (P) proxy is applied over three distinct climatological zones of the world for a single warm season: central and southern AZ of the United States, central Cuba, and North Korea. Global Forecast System (GFS) 0.25° by 0.25° forecast data for June, July, and August of 2019 is used to provide 6-hourly CAPE and precipitation rate, while Global Lightning Dataset (GLD360) data for the period 2016 to 2020 is used to provide observed lightning strokes. A five-year lightning climatology study is conducted …


Evaluation Of The Armas-Som Framework With Real Data, Brandon M. Blakely Mar 2022

Evaluation Of The Armas-Som Framework With Real Data, Brandon M. Blakely

Theses and Dissertations

The ARMAS framework was created with the goal of developing a framework for all-source sensors which is able to combine detection, identification, calibration, model selection, and independent evaluation into a single system. Stable Observability Monitoring (SOM), augments the original ARMAS framework by enabling ARMAS to detect whether or not its Fault Detection and Exclusion (FDE) capabilities can be trusted and when additional sensor information is required to maintain resiliency. While previously tested with simulated sensor data, SOM has yet to be tested with real-life sensor data. Furthermore, ARMAS has only been tested with real-life GNSS data. This work expands on …


Global Sporadic-E Climatological Analysis Using Gps Radio Occultation And Ionosonde Data, Travis J. Hodos Mar 2022

Global Sporadic-E Climatological Analysis Using Gps Radio Occultation And Ionosonde Data, Travis J. Hodos

Theses and Dissertations

A climatology of sporadic-E (Es) derived from a combined data set of GPS radio occultation (GPS-RO) and ground-based ionosonde soundings is presented for the period from September 2006 to February 2019. The ionosonde soundings were measured using the Lowell Digisonde International (LDI) Global Ionosphere Radio Observatory (GIRO) network consisting of 65 sites and 13,141,060 total soundings. The GPS-RO observations were taken aboard the Constellation Observing System for Meteorology, Ionosphere, and Climate (COSMIC) satellites and processed using two binary Es detection algorithms, totaling 9,072,922 occultations. The first algorithm is an S4 amplitude threshold calibrated to the occurrence of any blanketing Es …


Malware Detection Using Electromagnetic Side-Channel Analysis, Matthew A. Bergstedt Mar 2022

Malware Detection Using Electromagnetic Side-Channel Analysis, Matthew A. Bergstedt

Theses and Dissertations

Many physical systems control or monitor important applications without the capacity to monitor for malware using on-device resources. Thus, it becomes valuable to explore malware detection methods for these systems utilizing external or off-device resources. This research investigates the viability of employing EM SCA to determine whether a performed operation is normal or malicious. A Raspberry Pi 3 was set up as a simulated motor controller with code paths for a normal or malicious operation. While the normal path only calculated the motor speed before updating the motor, the malicious path added a line of code to modify the calculated …


Testbed Creation To Study Noise Radar Network Weighting Models And Data Fusion With Radio Tomographic Imaging, Ryan M. Jans Mar 2022

Testbed Creation To Study Noise Radar Network Weighting Models And Data Fusion With Radio Tomographic Imaging, Ryan M. Jans

Theses and Dissertations

Significant research has been conducted on RTI weighting models; however, very little comparative research has been conducted for NRN weighting methods. In order to create comparative weighting methods for NRN, it is necessary to create a testbed which allows for RTI and NRN research to be conducted simultaneously and allow for data fusion methods to also be researched. After creating the testbed and analyzing results, the newly proposed weighting method provides an up to 33% performance increase in target localization accuracy when compared to the previous weighting model used for NRN. The attenuation image resolution improvements resulted in a 79% …


Monocular Camera Localization Using A Bag Of Visual Words From Virtual World Data, Joshua A. Rinaldi Mar 2022

Monocular Camera Localization Using A Bag Of Visual Words From Virtual World Data, Joshua A. Rinaldi

Theses and Dissertations

The Visual Localization problem is the question of how to use visual information to determine the location of the camera that captured that data. The wide availability and low price of RGB cameras has made this useful in many fields such as SLAM, SAM and AR. This research seeks to determine if a BOVW can adequately overcome repetitious features in indoor environments and be effectively incorporated into a VL pipeline.


Magnetic Flux Channel Antenna Design In Conformal Applications, William J. Tremblay Mar 2022

Magnetic Flux Channel Antenna Design In Conformal Applications, William J. Tremblay

Theses and Dissertations

Magnetic Flux Channels (MFC) and Magneto-Dielectric Wire Antennas (MDWA) are effective, and in some cases, superior alternatives to traditional metallic antennas, in conformal and electrically small applications at the cost of fabrication and feed complexity. The frequency dispersive nature of magnetic material constituent parameters imposes constraints on the antenna design process, which were not fully developed in prior art. This research quantifies the key differences between the operating regions of magneto-dielectric materials for antenna applications and demonstrates the effectiveness of numerical method augmented modal analysis in the design process, regardless of operating region. Modeling challenges associated with MDWAs are addressed …


Deep Learning Techniques To Estimate 3d Position In Stereoscopic Imagery, Jonathan I. Nicholson Mar 2022

Deep Learning Techniques To Estimate 3d Position In Stereoscopic Imagery, Jonathan I. Nicholson

Theses and Dissertations

Current AAR efforts utilize machine vision algorithms to estimate the pose of a receiver aircraft. However, these algorithms are dependent on several conditions such as the availability of precise 3D aircraft models; the accuracy of the pipeline significantly degrades in the absence of high-quality information given beforehand. We propose a deep learning architecture that estimates the 3D position of an object based on stereoscopic imagery. We investigate the use of both machine learning techniques and neural networks to directly regress the 3D position of the receiver aircraft. We present a new position estimation framework that is based on the differences …


Considering Dds In The Domain Of Dis - Pros And Cons, Nathaniel R. Peck Mar 2022

Considering Dds In The Domain Of Dis - Pros And Cons, Nathaniel R. Peck

Theses and Dissertations

DIS is a legacy IEEE standard for defining and structuring PDUs in large scale distributed wargames. Although the standard specifies various QoS appropriate for certain PDUs, a one-size-fits-all transport strategy is traditionally employed via UDP. Since the inception of DIS, the OMG has produced a standard for a DDS which has been implemented by several middleware vendors. DDS middleware offers an abstraction for network communications that allows applications and developers to easily employ configurable QoS by topic. Adoption and use of these QoS in DIS applications may introduce greater compliance with the IEEE standard and enrich the service features available …


Utilization Of Characteristic Modal Analysis For Antenna Design Needed For An Afit Satellite, Scott C. Podlogar Mar 2022

Utilization Of Characteristic Modal Analysis For Antenna Design Needed For An Afit Satellite, Scott C. Podlogar

Theses and Dissertations

Antenna design is a pervasive, growing field for electrical engineers. As the number of new materials and techniques increase so too does the demand and requirements pushing forth new innovative ideas. Among these ideas is a leading edge analytic technique called Characteristic Modal Analysis (CMA) originally credited to Garbacz and Turpin. CMA works to break down the current distribution along a structure in a way that can offer great insights into how that structure operates as an antenna. This technique has great merits in post design analytics but it is rarely seen to be integrated into the design process. This …


Design Study For An Antenna Radar Cross Section Measurement Test Fixture, Wayne C. Kreimeyer Mar 2022

Design Study For An Antenna Radar Cross Section Measurement Test Fixture, Wayne C. Kreimeyer

Theses and Dissertations

Military technology requires equipment to be undetected by adversaries. Stealth aircraft are designed to be undetected through electromagnetic means by minimizing a return signature called the RCS. Therefore, it is essential to understand how antennas, which are necessary for communication, affect the overall RCS of the aircraft. The antenna is measured in a compact RADAR range. The antenna needs a structure to support it, also referred to as a test fixture, that does not interfere with the measuring process of the antenna’s RCS. This thesis set out to get the lowest RCS possible of a test fixture by evaluating different …


Performance Assessment Of Navigation Using Carrier Doppler Measurements From Multiple Leo Constellations, Michael J. Hartnett Mar 2022

Performance Assessment Of Navigation Using Carrier Doppler Measurements From Multiple Leo Constellations, Michael J. Hartnett

Theses and Dissertations

The goal of this work is to characterize a novel navigation method which uses carrier Doppler shift measurements from LEO satellites. An ever-growing reliance on the GNSS has coincided with an increase in ways it can be degraded or denied, whether naturally occurring or man-made. These potentially disastrous threats to traditional navigation and timing have necessitated new technologies to augment GNSS in the case of an outage. LEO constellations, whose size and higher signal power make them potentially useful for navigation, are one technology that has been explored. The navigation algorithms detailed in this research use Doppler measurements from 8 …


Ionospheric F-Layer Dipole Flute Instability Effects On Electromagnetic Scattering In A Magnetohydrodynamic Plasma, Andrew J. Knisely Nov 2021

Ionospheric F-Layer Dipole Flute Instability Effects On Electromagnetic Scattering In A Magnetohydrodynamic Plasma, Andrew J. Knisely

Theses and Dissertations

The ionosphere has significant impact on radio frequency (RF) applications such as satellites, over-the-horizon radar, and commercial communication systems. The dynamic processes effecting the behavior of the ionic content leads to a variety of instabilities that adversely affect the quality of RF signals. In the F-layer ionosphere, flute instability persists, appearing as two radial regions of high and low density perturbations elongated along the earth's geomagnetic field lines. The sizes of flute structures are comparable to the wavelengths in the high frequency spectrum. The objective is to characterize the high frequency scattering of an incident field by developing a 3D …


Collaborative All-Source Navigation With Integrity, Jonathon S. Gipson Sep 2021

Collaborative All-Source Navigation With Integrity, Jonathon S. Gipson

Theses and Dissertations

The novel ARMAS-SOM framework fuses collaborative all-source sensor information in a resilient manner with fault detection, exclusion, and integrity solutions recognizable to a GNSS user. This framework uses a multi-filter residual monitoring approach for fault detection and exclusion and is augmented with an additional "observability" EKF sub-layer for resilience. We monitor the a posteriori state covariances in this sub-layer to provide intrinsic awareness when navigation state observability assumptions required for integrity are in danger. This is used to selectively augment the framework with offboard information to preserve resilience. By maintaining split parallel collaborative and proprioceptive estimation instances and employing a …


Characterization Of Anisotropic Materials Using Scattered Field Measurements, Hirsch M. Chizever Sep 2021

Characterization Of Anisotropic Materials Using Scattered Field Measurements, Hirsch M. Chizever

Theses and Dissertations

This research uses monostatic far-zone scattered field measurements to estimate the permittivity of biaxial materials at X-Band. Utilizing Radar Cross Section (RCS) measurement techniques, this effort examines the efficacy of whole-sample TEM illumination in the estimation of anisotropic permittivity, in contrast with traditional subsample illumination methods. The research examines the impact that dielectric supports have on measurement error and uncertainty in permittivity estimates. Following an incremental approach, the research first demonstrates successful estimation of permittivity for isotropic spheres followed by a Teflon isotropic cube. Finally, the method is applied to uniaxial and biaxial cubes whose anisotropic permittivity is validated through …


Evaluating Testing Procedures For Openflow Controller Network Re-Provisioning Time, Steven J. Jensen Sep 2021

Evaluating Testing Procedures For Openflow Controller Network Re-Provisioning Time, Steven J. Jensen

Theses and Dissertations

Software-Defined Networking promises several advantages over traditional networking architectures, but has seen little adoption. Recently codified controller evaluation methodologies have seen little validation without strong statistical analysis of the results. The research developed an environment testing implementing a published Network Re-provisioning Time methodology to evaluate five OpenFlow controllers. The methodology is strong with required parameters but had issues with some edge cases. Further refinement and adding a convergence metric may close the gaps.


New Methods In Wavelet Analysis For Applications Of The Wavelet Transform, Jeffrey D. Williams Sep 2021

New Methods In Wavelet Analysis For Applications Of The Wavelet Transform, Jeffrey D. Williams

Theses and Dissertations

A commonality in the many applications and domains where signal processing (SP)is applied is the detection of events. Detection in SP requires the identification of the occurrence of an event, within a signal, and distinguishing the occurrence from no event. In a classical application of SP, seismologists seek to detect abnormalities in an electromagnetic (EM) signal to detect or not detect the occurrence of an earthquake, represented as an anomalous EM pulse. Since many signals are noisy, such as those produced by a seismograph, it can be challenging to distinguish a significant EM pulse from incident noise. In SP, smoothing …