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Full-Text Articles in Mechanical Engineering

Assessment Of Force Coordination And Neuromuscular Quickness In Healthy Adults, Karen L. Haberland Jan 2016

Assessment Of Force Coordination And Neuromuscular Quickness In Healthy Adults, Karen L. Haberland

Theses and Dissertations

Throughout daily life, it is necessary to handle and control innumerable objects. To do so, one’s hands must be precisely regulated. To ensure that an object is effectively manipulated, an individual must apply a grip force (GF) perpendicular to the object’s surface to overcome load force (LF), which acts tangential to the surface to counteract the object’s weight and inertia. Previous studies have shown an elaborate coordination between GF and LF in a variety of object manipulation tasks in healthy populations. This kinetic analysis is clinically important because the GF-LF coordination is shown to deteriorate in aging and neurologically impaired …


Efficiency Evaluation Of A Magnetically Driven Multiple Disk Centrifugal Blood Pump, Kayla H. Moody Jan 2016

Efficiency Evaluation Of A Magnetically Driven Multiple Disk Centrifugal Blood Pump, Kayla H. Moody

Theses and Dissertations

Heart failure is expected to ail over 8 million people in America by 2030 leaving many in need of cardiac replacement. To accommodate this large volume of people, ventricular assist devices (VADs) are necessary to provide mechanical circulatory support. Current VADs exhibit issues such as thrombosis and hemolysis caused by large local pressure drops and turbulent flow within the pump. Multiple disk centrifugal pumps (MDCPs) use shearing and centrifugal forces to produce laminar flow patterns and eliminate large pressure drops within the pump which greatly reduce risks that are in current VADs. The MDCP has a shaft drive system (SDS) …


In-Shoe Plantar Pressure System To Investigate Ground Reaction Force Using Android Platform, Ahmed A. Mostfa Jan 2016

In-Shoe Plantar Pressure System To Investigate Ground Reaction Force Using Android Platform, Ahmed A. Mostfa

Theses and Dissertations

Human footwear is not yet designed to optimally relieve pressure on the heel of the foot. Proper foot pressure assessment requires personal training and measurements by specialized machinery. This research aims to investigate and hypothesize about Preferred Transition Speed (PTS) and to classify the gait phase of explicit variances in walking patterns between different subjects. An in-shoe wearable pressure system using Android application was developed to investigate walking patterns and collect data on Activities of Daily Living (ADL). In-shoe circuitry used Flexi-Force A201 sensors placed at three major areas: heel contact, 1st metatarsal, and 5th metatarsal with a PIC16F688 microcontroller …