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Articles 31 - 42 of 42

Full-Text Articles in Engineering

The Role Of Ultrasound Cavitation In Liposome Size Reduction, William G. Pitt, Eric S. Richardson, Dixon J. Woodbury Mar 2007

The Role Of Ultrasound Cavitation In Liposome Size Reduction, William G. Pitt, Eric S. Richardson, Dixon J. Woodbury

Faculty Publications

Liposome size is a vital parameter of many quantitative biophysical studies. Sonication, or exposure to ultrasound, is used widely to manufacture artificial liposomes, yet little is known about the mechanism by which liposomes are affected by ultrasound. Cavitation, or the oscillation of small gas bubbles in a pressure-varying field, has been shown to be responsible for many biophysical effects of ultrasound on cells. Collapse cavitation is manifested in the acoustic spectrum by an f/2 subharmonic and an increase in broadband noise. In this study, we attempted to correlate the presence of cavitation with a decrease in liposome size. Lipid suspensions …


A Coarse Grain Model For Dna, Thomas A. Knotts, Nitin Rathore, David C. Schwartz, Juan J. De Pablo Feb 2007

A Coarse Grain Model For Dna, Thomas A. Knotts, Nitin Rathore, David C. Schwartz, Juan J. De Pablo

Faculty Publications

Understanding the behavior of DNA at the molecular level is of considerable fundamental and engineering importance. While adequate representations of DNA exist at the atomic and continuum level, there is a relative lack of models capable of describing the behavior of DNA at mesoscopic length scales. We present a mesoscale model of DNA that reduces the complexity of a nucleotide to three interactions sites, one each for the phosphate, sugar, and base, thereby rendering the investigation of DNA up to a few microns in length computationally tractable. The charges on these sites are considered explicitly. The model is parametrized using …


Frequency Response Of Solid-State Impact Ionization Multipliers, Joshua Beutler, Carlton S. Clauss, Michael S. Johnson, Aaron R. Hawkins, Mike D. Jack, George R. Chapman, Ken Kosai Jan 2007

Frequency Response Of Solid-State Impact Ionization Multipliers, Joshua Beutler, Carlton S. Clauss, Michael S. Johnson, Aaron R. Hawkins, Mike D. Jack, George R. Chapman, Ken Kosai

Faculty Publications

A study of the frequency response of solid-state impact ionization multipliers (SIMs) is presented that emphasizes the role of resistive and capacitive elements of the device to establish response limitations. SIMs are designed to amplify input currents from an external source through the impact ionization mechanism. An equivalent circuit model for the SIM is developed based on its current versus voltage characteristics, which is used to derive a frequency response model. Theoretical frequency response matches very closely to measured responses for first generation SIM devices constructed on p-type silicon epitaxial layers with nickel silicide Schottky contact injection points. Devices were …


Heat And Mass Transport In Heat Pipe Wick Structures, Brian D. Iverson, Tyler W. Davis, Suresh V. Garimella, Mark T. North, Sukhvinder S. Kang Jan 2007

Heat And Mass Transport In Heat Pipe Wick Structures, Brian D. Iverson, Tyler W. Davis, Suresh V. Garimella, Mark T. North, Sukhvinder S. Kang

Faculty Publications

A novel experimental approach is developed for characterizing the performance of heat pipe wick structures. This approach simulates the actual operation of wick structures in a heat pipe. Open, partially submerged, sintered copper wicks of varying pore size are studied under the partially saturated conditions found in normal heat pipe operation. A vertical wick orientation, where the capillary lift is in opposition to gravity, is selected to test the wicks under the most demanding conditions. Mass transport measurements of the working fluid, in addition to the temperature field, are obtained for the porous wicks under the action of a discrete …


Compliant High-Precision E-Quintet Ratcheting (Cheqr) Mechanism For Safety And Arming Devices, John A. Kennedy, Larry L. Howell, William Greenwood Jan 2007

Compliant High-Precision E-Quintet Ratcheting (Cheqr) Mechanism For Safety And Arming Devices, John A. Kennedy, Larry L. Howell, William Greenwood

Faculty Publications

Ratchet and pawl mechanisms are used in safety applications to provide mechanical isolation between inputs and an output to insure that extreme environmental conditions do not inadvertently allow an unexpected output. These devices have become smaller and are approaching a size regime where traditional precision components, such as precision bearings and springs, are not available. This paper introduces the Compliant High-precision E-Quintet Ratcheting (CHEQR) mechanism as a means of exploiting the advantages of compliant mechanisms to create safety devices that eliminate the need for bearings and springs. The pseudo-rigid-body model was used to design a mechanism with the desired force-deflection …


Aeronautical Telemetry Using Multiple-Antenna Transmitters, Michael A. Jensen, Michael D. Rice, Adam L. Anderson Jan 2007

Aeronautical Telemetry Using Multiple-Antenna Transmitters, Michael A. Jensen, Michael D. Rice, Adam L. Anderson

Faculty Publications

The placement of multiple antennas on an air vehicle is one possible practice for overcoming signal obstruction created by vehicle maneuvering during air-to-ground transmission. Unfortunately, for vehicle attitudes where more than one of these antennas has a clear path to the receiving station, this practice also leads to self-interference nulls, resulting in dramatic degradation in the average signal integrity. This paper discusses application of unitary space-time codes such as the Alamouti transmit diversity scheme and unitary differential space-time codes to overcome the self-interference effect observed in such systems. The mathematical foundations of these techniques within the context of this application …


Effects Of Moisture On Ignition Behavior Of Moist California Chaparral And Utah Leaves, Thomas H. Fletcher, Brent M. Pickett, Steven G. Smith, Gregory S. Spittle, Megan M. Woodhouse, Elizabeth Haake, David R. Weise Jan 2007

Effects Of Moisture On Ignition Behavior Of Moist California Chaparral And Utah Leaves, Thomas H. Fletcher, Brent M. Pickett, Steven G. Smith, Gregory S. Spittle, Megan M. Woodhouse, Elizabeth Haake, David R. Weise

Faculty Publications

Individual cuttings from eight plant species native to California chaparral or Utah were burned in a well-controlled, well-instrumented facility. Gas temperatures above a flat-flame burner were controlled at 987 C and 10 mol% O2, resulting in a heat flux at the leaf surface varying from 80–140 kW/m2. High moisture leaves were observed to burst due to the rapid escape of vapor from the leaf interior. Bubbles in or on the leaf surface were observed for leaves with moderate moisture contents. A large number of leaf temperature measurements were made, along with measurements of the ignition time …


Obstacle And Terrain Avoidance For Miniature Aerial Vehicles, Timothy Mclain, Jeff Saunders, Blake Barber, Randall W. Beard, Stephen R. Griffiths Jan 2007

Obstacle And Terrain Avoidance For Miniature Aerial Vehicles, Timothy Mclain, Jeff Saunders, Blake Barber, Randall W. Beard, Stephen R. Griffiths

Faculty Publications

Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) are playing increasingly prominent roles in defense programs and strategy around the world. Technology advancements have enabled the development of large UAVs (e.g., Global Hawk, Predator) and the creation of smaller, increasingly capable UAVs. The focus of this Chapter is on smaller fixed-wing miniature aerial vehicles (MAVs), which range in size from % to 2 m in wingspan. As recent conflicts have demonstrated, there are numerous military applications for MAVs including reconnaissance, surveillance, battle damage assessment, and communications relays.


High-Pressure Turbine Deposition In Land-Based Gas Turbines From Various Synfuels, Thomas H. Fletcher Jan 2007

High-Pressure Turbine Deposition In Land-Based Gas Turbines From Various Synfuels, Thomas H. Fletcher

Faculty Publications

Ash deposits from four candidate power turbine synfuels were studied in an accelerated deposition test facility. The facility matches the gas temperature and velocity of modern first-stage high-pressure turbine vanes. A natural gas combustor was seeded with finely ground fuel ash particulate from four different fuels: straw, sawdust, coal, and petroleum coke. The entrained ash particles were accelerated to a combustor exit flow Mach number of 0.31 before impinging on a thermal barrier coating (TBC) target coupon at 1150°C. Postexposure analyses included surface topography, scanning electron microscopy, and x-ray spectroscopy. Due to significant differences in the chemical composition of the …


Model Compound Study Of The Pathways For Aromatic Hydrocarbon Formation In Soot, Randall E. Winans, Nancy A. Tomczyk, Jerry E. Hunt, Mark S. Solum, Ronald J. Pugmire, Thomas H. Fletcher Jan 2007

Model Compound Study Of The Pathways For Aromatic Hydrocarbon Formation In Soot, Randall E. Winans, Nancy A. Tomczyk, Jerry E. Hunt, Mark S. Solum, Ronald J. Pugmire, Thomas H. Fletcher

Faculty Publications

As a follow-up of previous work on the flame pyrolysis of biphenyl and pyrene, a more detailed analysis of the pyrolytic products has been done using additional NMR data obtained on the whole soot sample correlated with detailed high-resolution and GC mass spectrometry data on the solvent-extracted portion of the same samples. These latter data complement the earlier NMR data with details of the pre-sooting structures, referred to as “young soot”, in pyrolyzed biphenyl samples collected at 1365, 1410, and 1470 K and pyrene at 1410 and 1470 K. The data reveal the roles played by free-radical-assisted polymerization reactions as …


Using Computational Fluid Dynamics Modeling To Improve The Performance Of A Solar Co2 Converter, Thomas H. Fletcher, Ralph J. Price, Reed J. Jensen Jan 2007

Using Computational Fluid Dynamics Modeling To Improve The Performance Of A Solar Co2 Converter, Thomas H. Fletcher, Ralph J. Price, Reed J. Jensen

Faculty Publications

A solar collector to convert CO2 to CO at high temperature was previously developed, achieving a product with 4-6 mol % CO from pure CO2. Modeling results showed that reactions occurred in the thermal boundary layer of the heated zirconia rod at temperatures greater than 2300 K. This paper describes results of computer modeling of advanced designs meant to increase the conversion of CO from CO2. Several design modifications were tested using the model, including changing the cool-down region configuration, increasing the zirconia rod diameter, and changing the zirconia rod shape. Several operational adjustments were also modeled, including reducing the …


A Cognitive Robotics Approach To Comprehending Human Language And Behaviors, Deryle W. Lonsdale, D. Paul Benjamin, Damian Lyons Jan 2007

A Cognitive Robotics Approach To Comprehending Human Language And Behaviors, Deryle W. Lonsdale, D. Paul Benjamin, Damian Lyons

Faculty Publications

The ADAPT project is a collaboration of researchers in linguistics, robotics and artificial intelligence at three universities. We are building a complete robotic cognitive architecture for a mobile robot designed to interact with humans in a range of environments, and which uses natural language and models human behavior. This paper concentrates on the HRI aspects of ADAPT, and especially on how ADAPT models and interacts with humans.