Biomedical Engineering and Bioengineering Commons^™

Development Of A Counter-Flow Thermal Gradient Microfluidic Device, Shayan Davani

Doctoral Dissertations

This work presents a novel counter-flow design for thermal stabilization of microfluidic thermal reactors. In these reactors, precise control of temperature of the liquid sample is achieved by moving the liquid sample through the thermal zones established ideally through the conduction in the solid material of the device. The goal here is to establish a linear thermal distribution when there is no flow and to minimize the temperature change at flow condition. External convection as well as internal flowinduced effects influence the prescribed thermal distribution. The counter-flow thermal gradient device developed in this study is capable of both stabilizing the …

Multifield Spectral Analysis Of Human Respiratory Sounds, John William Ray Jr.

Doctoral Dissertations

Computer analysis of human respiratory sounds (phonopneumography) has been attempted since the 1960s with poor results. Steady research efforts by numerous researchers have failed to yield a practical diagnostic tool to replace the physician and the stethoscope. This has been the result of the high degree of variability in proposed analysis parameters from subject to subject.

The purpose of this research is to examine a new approach to phonopneumography by comparing multiple lung fields of the same subject for the same breath in order to develop the diagnostic parameters. This approach has the advantage of allowing the subject to provide …