Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Engineering Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Theses/Dissertations

2013

Wayne State University Dissertations

Articles 1 - 30 of 46

Full-Text Articles in Engineering

Advanced Optimization Techniques For Monte Carlo Simulation On Graphics Processing Units, Eyad Hailat Jan 2013

Advanced Optimization Techniques For Monte Carlo Simulation On Graphics Processing Units, Eyad Hailat

Wayne State University Dissertations

The objective of this work is to design and implement a self-adaptive parallel GPU optimized Monte Carlo algorithm for the simulation of adsorption in porous materials. We focus on Nvidia's GPUs and CUDA's Fermi architecture specifically. The resulting package supports the different ensemble methods for the Monte Carlo simulation, which will allow for the simulation of multi-component adsorption in porous solids. Such an algorithm will have broad applications to the development of novel porous materials for the sequestration of CO2 and the filtration of toxic industrial chemicals.

The primary objective of this work is the release of a massively parallel …


Effect Of Intake Temperature And Boost Pressure On The Auto-Ignition Of Fuels With Different Cetane Numbers And Volatilities, Chandrasekharan Jayakumar Jan 2013

Effect Of Intake Temperature And Boost Pressure On The Auto-Ignition Of Fuels With Different Cetane Numbers And Volatilities, Chandrasekharan Jayakumar

Wayne State University Dissertations

The aim of this research is to investigate the effect of air inlet temperature and boost pressure on the auto-ignition of fuels that have different CNs and volatilities in a single cylinder diesel engine. The inlet air temperature is varied over a range of 30°C to 110°C at a constant intake pressure of 1.1 bar. The boost pressure is varied from 1.1 bar to 1.5 bar at a constant intake temperature of 60°C. All engine tests are run at steady-state conditions. The fuels used are ultra-low-sulfur-diesel (ULSD), JP-8 (two blends with CN 50 & 31) and F-T SPK. Detailed analysis …


Exergetic Analysis Of Hydrogen Combustion Involving Electronically Excited Species, Devon Alan Washington Jan 2013

Exergetic Analysis Of Hydrogen Combustion Involving Electronically Excited Species, Devon Alan Washington

Wayne State University Dissertations

Plasma-assisted combustion (PAC) is a growing field of research that involves using nonthermal plasma (NTP) to enhance combustion. PAC research involves modeling reaction mechanisms and chemical kinetics. Exergy analysis of combustion devices focuses on combustion irreversibility, including mixing, internal heat transfer, and oxidation. This novel research project merges these two branches of research.

The focus of this work is the application of exergy analysis to PAC systems, to analyze the effect introducing NTP has on trends in exergy destruction associated with oxidation during hydrogen combustion. This was accomplished by developing a plug flow reactor model using the chemical simulation tool …


Multiplexed Photometry And Fluorimetry Using Multiple Frequency Channels, Khaled M. Dadesh Jan 2013

Multiplexed Photometry And Fluorimetry Using Multiple Frequency Channels, Khaled M. Dadesh

Wayne State University Dissertations

ABSTRACT

MULTIPLEXED PHOTOMETRY AND FLUORIMETRY USING MULTIPLE FREQUENCY CHANNELS

by

KHALED M. DADESH

August 2013

Advisor: Dr. Amar Basu

Major: Electrical Engineering

Degree: Doctor of Philosophy

Multispectral photometry and fluorimetry are useful for quantifying and distinguishing samples during flow injection analysis, flow cytometry, and ratiometric absorbance measurement. However, multispectral detectors, including spectrometers, typically require arrayed or multiple light detectors, optical components, and path alignments, all of which increases the size and cost of the detection system. Several previous efforts have attempted the use of time division multiplexing or frequency division multiplexing (FDM) techniques to minimize both size …


Mission Aware Energy Saving Strategies For Army Ground Vehicles, Macam Dattathreya Jan 2013

Mission Aware Energy Saving Strategies For Army Ground Vehicles, Macam Dattathreya

Wayne State University Dissertations

Fuel energy is a basic necessity for this planet and the modern technology to perform many activities on earth. On the other hand, quadrupled automotive vehicle usage by the commercial industry and military has increased fuel consumption. Military readiness of Army ground vehicles is very important for a country to protect its people and resources. Fuel energy is a major requirement for Army ground vehicles. According to a report, a department of defense has spent nearly $13.6 billion on fuel and electricity to conduct ground missions. On the contrary, energy availability on this plant is slowly decreasing. Therefore, saving energy …


Simulations And Experiments Of Fuel Injection, Mixing And Combustion In Di Gasoline Engines, Yi Zheng Jan 2013

Simulations And Experiments Of Fuel Injection, Mixing And Combustion In Di Gasoline Engines, Yi Zheng

Wayne State University Dissertations

Direct Injection (DI) has been known for its improved performance and efficiency in gasoline spark-ignition engines. In order to take all the advantages of the GDI technology, it is important to investigate in detail the interactions of fuel spray and combustion system, such as air-fuel mixing, in-cylinder flow development, surface wetting, and turbulence intensity. The characterizations of the internal nozzle flow of DI injector are first studied using the multidimensional computational fluid dynamic (CFD) simulation. In the meanwhile the numerical and experimental studies are carried out to observe the external spray and wall impingements in an optical constant volume vessel. …


Enhanced Spontaneous Emission And Spectral Analysis Using Waveguide Based Devices., Pradeep Kumar Jan 2013

Enhanced Spontaneous Emission And Spectral Analysis Using Waveguide Based Devices., Pradeep Kumar

Wayne State University Dissertations

We will put abstract in here.


Investigation Of Pressure Fluctuations In The Hyporheic Zone In Response To Flow Around A Hydraulic Structure, Timothy Calappi Jan 2013

Investigation Of Pressure Fluctuations In The Hyporheic Zone In Response To Flow Around A Hydraulic Structure, Timothy Calappi

Wayne State University Dissertations

Erosion around a cylinders is a well studied field. Particles erode when lift and drag forces overcome a critical threshold. These forces are typically studied from above the water-riverbed interface. This study maps hyporheic pressure fluctuations as they are related to surface water velocity. The pressure map is used to evaluate lift enhancement and destabilization forces on the riverbed. High pressure events in the subsurface help generate a destabilizing force from within the riverbed. This work develops a probability distribution function relating turbulent velocity fluctuations and subsurface pressure fluctuations.

A cylinder was fitted with differential pressure transducers such that the …


Structure Borne Noise Analysis Using Helmholtz Equation Least Squares Based Forced Vibro Acoustic Components, Logesh Kumar Natarajan Jan 2013

Structure Borne Noise Analysis Using Helmholtz Equation Least Squares Based Forced Vibro Acoustic Components, Logesh Kumar Natarajan

Wayne State University Dissertations

This dissertation presents a structure-borne noise analysis technology that is focused on providing a cost-effective noise reduction strategy. Structure-borne sound is generated or transmitted through structural vibration; however, only a small portion of the vibration can effectively produce sound and radiate it to the far-field. Therefore, cost-effective noise reduction is reliant on identifying and suppressing the critical vibration components that are directly responsible for an undesired sound. However, current technologies cannot successfully identify these critical vibration components from the point of view of direct contribution to sound radiation and hence cannot guarantee the best cost-effective noise reduction.

The technology developed …


Maximizing Resource Utilization In Video Streaming Systems, Mohammad A. Alsmirat Jan 2013

Maximizing Resource Utilization In Video Streaming Systems, Mohammad A. Alsmirat

Wayne State University Dissertations

Video streaming has recently grown dramatically in popularity over the Internet, Cable TV, and wire-less networks. Because of the resource demanding nature of video streaming applications, maximizing resource utilization in any video streaming system is a key factor to increase the scalability and decrease the cost of the system. Resources to utilize include server bandwidth, network bandwidth, battery life in battery operated devices, and processing time in limited processing power devices. In this work, we propose new techniques to maximize the utilization of video-on-demand (VOD) server resources. In addition to that, we propose new framework to maximize the utilization of …


Development And Implementation Of A Proactive Safety Performance Evaluation System For General Contractors, Ahmet Selim Alpmen Jan 2013

Development And Implementation Of A Proactive Safety Performance Evaluation System For General Contractors, Ahmet Selim Alpmen

Wayne State University Dissertations

Construction safety is an essential aspect of the construction industry and measuring safety performance has been of continuing concern. Most of the preceding studies concentrated on two widely used metrics in industry to evaluate and improve safety performance, EMR and incidence rates. However, it is recognized that these metrics have shortcomings, such as being reactive and not proactive, or representing a macroscopic approach and not microscopic approach, or disregarding the events that lead to accidents and only being result-oriented. Improving safety is one aspect of a research but using an appropriate safety measure is as important. Using these parameters comes …


How Atomic Level Interactions Drive Membrane Fusion: Insights From Molecular Dynamics Simulations, Navendu Bhatnagar Jan 2013

How Atomic Level Interactions Drive Membrane Fusion: Insights From Molecular Dynamics Simulations, Navendu Bhatnagar

Wayne State University Dissertations

This project is focused on identifying the role of key players in the membrane fusion process at the atomic level with the use of molecular dynamics simulations. Membrane fusion of apposed bilayers is one of the most fundamental and frequently occurring biological phenomena in living organisms. It is an essential step in several cellular processes such as neuronal exocytosis, sperm fusion with oocytes and intracellular fusion of organelles to name a few. Membrane fusion is a frequent process in a living organism but is still not fully understood at the atomic level in terms of the role of various factors …


Ionization In Diesel Combustion For On-Board Diagnostics And Engine Control, Tamer Hassan Badawy Jan 2013

Ionization In Diesel Combustion For On-Board Diagnostics And Engine Control, Tamer Hassan Badawy

Wayne State University Dissertations

Diesel engines have been known for their high thermal efficiency and specific power output, but there is concern about engine-out NOx and particulate matter emissions. To meet the current emission standards, advanced diesel engines are fitted with electronically controlled fuel injection systems and sophisticated and expensive after-treatment devices. Further improvements are still needed to meet future goals in better fuel economy and the more stringent emission standards. In order to meet these goals, there is a need for the control of the combustion process to reduce engine-out emissions in real-time and reduce the demand on the after-treatment devices. This requires …


Emerging Design Methodology And Its Implementation Through Rns And Qca, Omar Dajani Jan 2013

Emerging Design Methodology And Its Implementation Through Rns And Qca, Omar Dajani

Wayne State University Dissertations

Digital logic technology has been changing dramatically from integrated circuits, to a Very Large Scale Integrated circuits (VLSI) and to a nanotechnology logic circuits. Research focused on increasing the speed and reducing the size of the circuit design. Residue Number System (RNS) architecture has ability to support high speed concurrent arithmetic applications. To reduce the size, Quantum-Dot Cellular Automata (QCA) has become one of the new nanotechnology research field and has received a lot of attention within the engineering community due to its small size and ultralow power.

In the last decade, residue number system has received increased attention due …


Visual Exploration And Information Analytics Of High-Dimensional Medical Images, Darshan Pai Jan 2013

Visual Exploration And Information Analytics Of High-Dimensional Medical Images, Darshan Pai

Wayne State University Dissertations

Data visualization has transformed how we analyze increasingly large and complex data sets. Advanced visual tools logically represent data in a way that communicates the most important information inherent within it and culminate the analysis with an insightful conclusion. Automated analysis disciplines - such as data mining, machine learning, and statistics - have traditionally been the most dominant fields for data analysis. It has been complemented with a near-ubiquitous adoption of specialized hardware and software environments that handle the storage, retrieval, and pre- and postprocessing of digital data. The addition of interactive visualization tools allows an active human participant in …


The Role Of Tissue Sound Speed As A Surrogate Marker Of Breast Density, Mark Sak Jan 2013

The Role Of Tissue Sound Speed As A Surrogate Marker Of Breast Density, Mark Sak

Wayne State University Dissertations

Breast density is one of the strongest predictors of breast cancer risk as women with the densest breasts have a three- to five-fold increase in risk compared to women with the least dense breasts. Breast density is currently measured by using mammography, the current gold standard for breast imaging. There are many shortcomings to using mammography to measure breast density, including the use of ionizing radiation. Ultrasound tomography (UST) does not use ionizing radiation and can create tomographic breast sound speed images. These sound speed images are useful because breast density is proportional to sound speed. The purpose of this …


Synthesis And Characterization Of Transition Metal Arsenide Nanocrystals And The Metastability And Magneto-Structural Phase Transition Behavior Of Mnas Nanocrystals, Yanhua Zhang Jan 2013

Synthesis And Characterization Of Transition Metal Arsenide Nanocrystals And The Metastability And Magneto-Structural Phase Transition Behavior Of Mnas Nanocrystals, Yanhua Zhang

Wayne State University Dissertations

This dissertation study focuses on (1) probing the magneto-structural phase transformation in nanoscale MnAs; (2) evaluation of the size-dependent phase stability of type-B MnAs (prepared by rapid injection); and (3) developing a general synthetic method for transition metal arsenide nanoparticles.

Discrete MnAs nanoparticles that adopt different structures at room temperature (type-A, α-structure and type-B, β-structure) have been prepared by the solution-phase arrested precipitation method. Atomic pair distribution and Rietveld refinement were employed on synchrotron data to explore the structural transitions of the bulk and nanoparticle samples, and these results were compared to AC magnetic susceptibility measurements of the samples. The …


Quality Modeling And Improvement Of University Facilities Services Using Six-Sigma - A Case Study On Wayne State University Fpm Services, Mohsen F. Mohamed Isa Jan 2013

Quality Modeling And Improvement Of University Facilities Services Using Six-Sigma - A Case Study On Wayne State University Fpm Services, Mohsen F. Mohamed Isa

Wayne State University Dissertations

Literature survey shows that there is no published information concerning the investigation and/or evaluation (by the customer) of the services provided by universities facilities management units, and no previous research was done to measure and evaluate such services to address, identify, and model the critical factors affecting quality.

This research work proposed a service quality model relating factors affecting quality of services provided by facility management units at higher educational institutions to the customer perception of service quality. It also examined the use of the Six-Sigma DMAIC methodology as an improvement strategy for services provided by facility management units at …


Analysis Of Fatal And Nonfatal Accidents Involving Earthmoving Equipment Operators And On-Foot Workers, Esref Emrah Kazan Jan 2013

Analysis Of Fatal And Nonfatal Accidents Involving Earthmoving Equipment Operators And On-Foot Workers, Esref Emrah Kazan

Wayne State University Dissertations

In view of the limitations of univariate statistics for studying construction accidents, a multivariate approach was undertaken using crosstabulation analysis and logistic regression.

Heavy construction equipment accidents related data for four type of equipment; backhoe, bulldozer, excavator and scraper were incorporated in the study using categorical variables. Degree of injury indicating the severity of accident outcome (fatal vs. nonfatal) was selected as the dependent variable, and a variety of factors potentially affecting the outcome comprised the independent variables. Cross tabulation results enabled the understanding and evaluation of associations between the research variables, while logistic regression yielded predictive models that helped …


Impact Damage Analysis Of Balsa Wood Sandwich Composite Materials, Suof Abdalslam Jan 2013

Impact Damage Analysis Of Balsa Wood Sandwich Composite Materials, Suof Abdalslam

Wayne State University Dissertations

No abstract provided.


Modeling Of Mouse Eye And Errors In Ocular Parameters Affecting Refractive State, Gurinder Bawa Jan 2013

Modeling Of Mouse Eye And Errors In Ocular Parameters Affecting Refractive State, Gurinder Bawa

Wayne State University Dissertations

ABSTRACT

MODELING OF MOUSE EYE AND ERRORS IN OCULAR PARAMETERS AFFECTING REFRACTIVE STATE

by

GURINDER BAWA

September 2013

Advisor: Dr. Ivan Avrutsky

Major: Electrical Engineering

Degree: Doctor of Philosophy

Rodents eye are particularly used to study refractive error state of an eye and development of refractive eye. Genetic organization of rodents is similar to that of humans, which makes them interesting candidates to be researched upon. From rodents family mice models are encouraged over rats because of availability of genetically engineered models. Despite of extensive work that has been performed on mice and rat models, still no one is able …


Use Of Focused Ultrasound For Transcranial Sonothrombolysis, Golnaz Ahadi Jan 2013

Use Of Focused Ultrasound For Transcranial Sonothrombolysis, Golnaz Ahadi

Wayne State University Dissertations

Worldwide, stroke is the second most common cause of death. Ischemic stroke remains accountable for the majority of the 20 million devastating stroke events occurring globally each year. Use of transcranial focused ultrasound (FUS) for sonothrombolysis is a new research field for ischemic stroke treatment. If shown to be effective, FUS sonothrombolysis could become a widely available treatment option for the majority of the stroke sufferers that do not qualify or do not have access to current thrombolytic treatment options, such as tPA or neurointerventional methods.

The current study was an in vitro transcranial FUS headsystem investigation for the potential …


Polymeric Nanocarriers And Their Oral Inhalation Formulations For The Regional Delivery Of Nucleic Acids To The Lungs, Denise Santos Conti Jan 2013

Polymeric Nanocarriers And Their Oral Inhalation Formulations For The Regional Delivery Of Nucleic Acids To The Lungs, Denise Santos Conti

Wayne State University Dissertations

Gene therapy has attracted attention in the fields of medicine, pharmacy, and bionanotechnology due to the potential for treating a large number of medically relevant diseases. Oral inhalation (OI) is a promising route for the administration of therapeutics, including small molecules and biomacromolecules, such as nucleotides, peptides, and proteins, to (locally) and through (systemically) the lungs. The use of OI is especially attractive for the delivery of nucleic acids as it provides a direct and non-invasive route for targeting the lungs. Pressurized metered-dose inhalers (pMDIs), are the most commonly used OI in treatment of lung diseases and are thus promising …


Experimental Investigation And Development Of An Extended Two Color Method (Etcm) With Application To Internal Combustion Engines, Elena Florea Jan 2013

Experimental Investigation And Development Of An Extended Two Color Method (Etcm) With Application To Internal Combustion Engines, Elena Florea

Wayne State University Dissertations

The internal combustion engine is on a continuous path of improvement to reduce exhaust gaseous emissions and improve fuel economy. While recent trends in diesel engine development have lowered the EGR requirements, future regulatory pressure will likely result in a reversed trend in the future.

Given this, it is of interest to improve the application range of diagnostic tools such as the two color method (TCM) typically used in evaluating the properties of engine soot, such as temperature and volume fraction. This optical diagnostic method relies on the use of the light emitted by the soot particles along with a …


Green Diesel Production Via Catalytic Hydrogenation/Decarboxylation Of Triglycerides And Fatty Acids Of Vegetable Oil And Brown Grease, Elvan Sari Jan 2013

Green Diesel Production Via Catalytic Hydrogenation/Decarboxylation Of Triglycerides And Fatty Acids Of Vegetable Oil And Brown Grease, Elvan Sari

Wayne State University Dissertations

Increase in the petroleum prices, projected increases in the world’s energy demand and environmental awareness have shifted the research interest to the alternative fuel technologies. In particular, green diesel, vegetable oil/animal fat/waste oil and grease derived hydrocarbons in diesel boiling range, has become an attractive alternative to biodiesel— a mixture of fatty acid methyl esters, particularly due to its superior fuel properties that are similar to petroleum diesel. Hence, green diesel can be used as a drop-in fuel in the current diesel engines. The current technology for production of green diesel– hydrodeoxygenation of triglycerides and fatty acids over conventional hydrotreating …


Development Of A Two-Color Optical Diagnostic For The Determination Of Engine In-Cylinder Soot Temperature And Volume Fraction Evolution With A Flame-Calibrated Emissivity Model, Kan Zha Jan 2013

Development Of A Two-Color Optical Diagnostic For The Determination Of Engine In-Cylinder Soot Temperature And Volume Fraction Evolution With A Flame-Calibrated Emissivity Model, Kan Zha

Wayne State University Dissertations

A fundamental understanding of advanced compression ignition combustion is requisite to meet the simultaneous challenges of stringent fuel efficiency and emission standards. Single zone simulation shows that nitrogen oxide (NOx) production occurs in a high temperature region and soot production in a high equivalence ratio region within a specific temperature window. Combustion temperature, therefore, is a crucial variable that determines soot and NOx emissions under various combustion modes, and it is thus very important to have the capability to quantify this parameter in-cylinder. Optical diagnostic techniques such as -- Rayleigh scattering, filtered Raman scattering (Doppler), Raman scattering, coherent anti-stokes Raman …


Learning With An Insufficient Supply Of Data Via Knowledge Transfer And Sharing, Samir Al-Stouhi Jan 2013

Learning With An Insufficient Supply Of Data Via Knowledge Transfer And Sharing, Samir Al-Stouhi

Wayne State University Dissertations

As machine learning methods extend to more complex and diverse set of problems, situations arise where the complexity and availability of data presents a situation where the information source is not "adequate" to generate a representative hypothesis. Learning from multiple sources of data is a promising research direction as researchers leverage ever more diverse sources of information. Since data is not readily available, knowledge has to be transferred from other sources and new methods (both supervised and un-supervised) have to be developed to selectively share and transfer knowledge. In this dissertation, we present both supervised and un-supervised techniques to tackle …


Multiscale Design And Life-Cycle Based Sustainability Assessment Of Polymer Nanocomposite Coatings, Rohan Ganesh Uttarwar Jan 2013

Multiscale Design And Life-Cycle Based Sustainability Assessment Of Polymer Nanocomposite Coatings, Rohan Ganesh Uttarwar

Wayne State University Dissertations

In recent years, nanocoatings with exceptionally improved and new performance properties have found numerous applications in the automotive, aerospace, ship-making, chemical, electronics, steel, construction, and many other industries. Especially the formulations providing multiple functionalities to cured paint films are believed to dominate the coatings market in the near future. It has shifted the focus of research towards building sustainable coating recipes which can deliver multiple functionalities through applied films. The challenge to this exciting area of research arrives from the insufficient knowledge about structure-property correlations of nanocoating materials and their design complexity. Experimental efforts have been successful in developing certain …


Opacity Of Discrete Event Systems: Analysis And Control, Majed Mohamed Ben Kalefa Jan 2013

Opacity Of Discrete Event Systems: Analysis And Control, Majed Mohamed Ben Kalefa

Wayne State University Dissertations

The exchange of sensitive information in many systems over a network can be manipulated

by unauthorized access. Opacity is a property to investigate security and

privacy problems in such systems. Opacity characterizes whether a secret information

of a system can be inferred by an unauthorized user. One approach to verify security

and privacy properties using opacity problem is to model the system that may leak confidential

information as a discrete event system. The problem that has not investigated

intensively is the enforcement of opacity properties by supervisory control. In other

words, constructing a minimally restrictive supervisor to limit the system's …


Demand Modeling And Capacity Planning For Innovative Short Life-Cycle Products, Saman Alaniazar Jan 2013

Demand Modeling And Capacity Planning For Innovative Short Life-Cycle Products, Saman Alaniazar

Wayne State University Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on demand modeling and capacity planning for innovative short life-cycle products. We first developed a new model in the class of stochastic Bass formulations that addresses the shortcomings of models from the extant literature. The proposed model considers the common fact that the market potential of a product is not fixed and might change during a life-cycle due to exogenous (e.g., economic- or competitors-related) or endogenous (e.g., quality-related) factors. Allowing this parameter (market potential in the Bass model) to follow a geometric random walk, we have showed that the future demand of a product in each period …