Operations Research, Systems Engineering and Industrial Engineering Commons^™

Analyzing The Fundamental Aspects And Developing A Forecasting Model To Enhance The Student Admission And Enrollment System Of Msom Program, Sultanul Nahian Hasnat

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A forecasting model, associated with predictive analysis, is an elementary requirement for academic leaders to plan course requirements. The M.S. in Operations Management (MSOM) program at the University of Arkansas desires to understand future student enrollment more accurately. The available literature shows that there is an absence of forecasting models based on quantitative, qualitative and predictive analysis. This study develops a combined forecasting model focusing on three admission stages. The research uses simple regression, Delphi analysis, Analysis of Variance (ANOVA), and classification tree system to develop the models. It predicts that 272, 173, and 136 new students will apply, matriculate …

Systematic Review For Water Network Failure Models And Cases, Yufei Gao

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

As estimated in the American Society of Civil Engineers 2017 report, in the United States, there are approximately 240,000 water main pipe breaks each year. To help estimate pipe breaks and maintenance frequency, a number of physically-based and statistically-based water main failure prediction models have been developed in the last 30 years. Precious review papers focused more on the evolution of failure models rather than modeling results. However, the modeling results of different models applied in case studies are worth reviewing as well.

In this review, we focus on research papers after Year 2008 and collect latest cases without repetition. …

Methodologies For Solving Integrated Transportation And Scheduling Problems, Fereydoun Adbesh

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research proposes novel solution techniques to optimize two real-world problems in the area of scheduling and transportation. We first consider a model for optimizing the operations of dredges. In this problem, scheduling and assignment decisions are integrated across a finite planning horizon. Additional constraints and problem elements explicitly considered include, but are not limited, to environmental work window restrictions, budget limitations, dredge operation rates and schedule-dependent dredge availability. Our approach makes use of Constraint Programming (CP) to obtain quality and robust solutions within an amount of time small enough to be useful to practitioners. The expanded feature set of …

Airport Security Investment Model, Joshua Daniel Bolton

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In an increasingly mobile and diverse world, it is difficult to quantify the risk, or danger, associated with traveling. Airports have suffered greatly for being unable to define potential risks and protect against them. Intelligent adversary risk is a complicated high-level issue for many airports. Airports are targeted because of the large amount of people in a confined space and the social, economic, and psychological impact of terrorist attacks on the American people. In the months following September 11th, 2001, the airline industry in the United States lost $1.1 billion in revenue. The American people stayed grounded, for fear of …

An Economic Analysis Of Residential Photovoltaic Systems With And Without Energy Storage, Rodney Moses Kizito

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Residential photovoltaic (PV) systems serve as a source of electricity generation that is separate from the traditional utilities. Investor investment into residential PV systems provides several financial benefits such as federal tax credit incentives for installation, net metering credit from excess generated electricity added back to the grid, and savings in price per kilowatt-hour (kWh) from the PV system generation versus the increasing conventional utility price per kWh. As much benefit as stand-alone PV systems present, the incorporation of energy storage yields even greater benefits. Energy storage (ES) is capable of storing unused PV provided energy from daytime periods of …

Decision Support System For Container Port Selection Using Multiple-Objective Decision Analysis, Rivelino De Icaza

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Ports are essential for maritime transportation and global supply chains since they are nodes that connect the sea- and land-based modes of transportation. With containerization and supply chains stimulating global trade, ports are challenged to adjust to changes in the market to create value to their customers. Therefore, this dissertation research focuses on the container port selection decision analysis to provide information to help shipping lines select the best port for their shipping networks. Since the problem is complex, dynamic, and involves multiple and conflicting criteria, the research proposes to use the multi-objective decision analysis with Value-Focused Thinking approach. The …

Models And Methodologies To Address Emerging Needs In Network And Supply Chain Optimization, Forough Enayaty Ahangar

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, we model three different security scenarios and propose solution methodologies to address each problem.

Chapter 2 presents a large-scale optimization approach for solving a dynamic bi-level network interdiction problem (NIP) in which interdiction activities must be scheduled in order to minimize the cumulative maximum flow over a finite time horizon. A logic-based decomposition (LBD) approach is proposed that utilizes constraint programming to exploit the scheduling nature of this dynamic NIP. Chapter 3 considers a set of centers to which content (e.g., data or smuggled items), are assigned to ensure availability. An interdictor (e.g., border security officials) attempts …

Simulation Modeling Approach For Evaluating A Solution Designed To Alleviate The Congestion Of Passenger Flow At The Composure Area Of Security Checkpoints, Maria Luisa Janer Rubio

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In a previous study, we found that replacing the exit roller of a security checkpoint lane for a continuously circulating conveyor could potentially increase the throughput of passengers by over 28% while maintaining the TSA security-waiting time limit (Janer and Rossetti 2016). This study intends to expand this previous effort by investigating the impact of this circulating conveyor on the secondary screening related processes. Leone and Liu (2011) found that imposing a limit on the x-ray screening time, and diverting any item exceeding this limit to secondary screening, could decrease the waiting time by 43%. Our objective is to verify …

Essays In Measuring, Controlling, And Coordinating Supply Chain Inventory And Transportation Operations, Payam Parsa

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Supply chain collaboration programs, such as continuous replenishment program (CRP), is among the most popular supply chain management practices. CRP is an arrangement between two partners in a supply chain to share information on a regular basis for lowering logistics costs while maintaining or increasing service levels. CRP shifts the replenishment responsibility to the upstream partner to avoid the bullwhip effect across the supply chain. This dissertation aims to quantify, measure, and expand the benefits of CRP for the purpose of reducing logistics cost and improving customer service. The developed models in this dissertation are all applied in different case …

Personalized Decision Modeling For Intervention And Prevention Of Cancers, Fan Wang

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Personalized medicine has been utilized in all stages of cancer care in recent years, including the prevention, diagnosis, treatment and follow-up. Since prevention and early intervention are particularly crucial in reducing cancer mortalities, personalizing the corresponding strategies and decisions so as to provide the most appropriate or optimal medical services for different patients can greatly improve the current cancer control practices. This dissertation research performs an in-depth exploration of personalized decision modeling of cancer intervention and prevention problems. We investigate the patient-specific screening and vaccination strategies for breast cancer and the cancers related to human papillomavirus (HPV), representatively. Three popular …

Is It We Or They? The Effect Of Identity On Collaboration And Performance In Buyer-Supplier Relationships, Siqi Ma

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In today’s scale-driven and technology-intensive global economy, collaboration becomes the supply chain’s core capability (Liker and Choi, 2004). A well-developed ability to create and sustain fruitful collaborations gives companies a significant competitive advantage (Kanter, 1994). Retailers are increasingly relying on their suppliers to reduce costs, improve quality, and develop new processes and products faster than their rivals’ vendors can. On the other hand, suppliers benefit from retailers that they are able to monitor store-level demand in real time in order to ensure the top-selling items are in-stock or the accuracy and timeliness of retailer’s demand forecast. Previous literature has shown …

Service Consistency In Vehicle Routing, Kunlei Lian

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis studies service consistency in the context of multi-period vehicle routing problems (VRP) in which customers require repeatable services over a planning horizon of multiple days. Two types of service consistency are considered, namely, driver consistency and time consistency. Driver consistency refers to using the fewest number of different drivers to perform all of the visits required by a customer over a planning horizon and time consistency refers to visiting a customer at roughly the same time on each day he/she needs service. First, the multi-objective consistent VRP is defined to explore the trade-offs between the objectives of travel …

Developing Sustainable Rice Production Through Image Classification, Parker R. Fitzgerald

Industrial Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

The agricultural industry’s continued success is critical to our future. However, many agricultural practices—specifically rice farming—are currently based on unsustainable methods. The processes used in rice farming consume water at an unsupportable rate, and, consequently, are serious contributors to rising emission levels. Several alternative growing methods have been introduced, and one of the most promising candidates is Alternative Wetting and Drying (AWD). An obstacle encountered by proponents of these methods comes in implementation. Studies have shown AWD is more successful in fields with higher leveling precision. The research in this study works to create a stepping stone for farmers to …

Exploring The Association Between Patient Waiting Time, No-Shows And Overbooking Strategy To Improve Efficiency In Health Care, Cam Tu M. Nguyen

Industrial Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Many primary care clinics are using overbooking as a strategy to mitigate the negative impacts on operations and performance caused by patient nonattendance of appointments, also known as “no-shows”. However, overbooking tends to increase patient waiting time and worker overtime. It is also acknowledged that patient waiting time is associated with no-show behavior, yet there is a lack of observational study to quantify the relationship. The overall goal of this research is to explore the relationships between patient waiting time, no-show behavior and overbooking strategy in terms of clinic performance. Arena® simulation software is used to create a discrete-event simulation …

A Quantitative Model For Truck Parking Utilization With Hours Of Service Regulations, Alexis Christine Gaddy

Industrial Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Continual growth in traffic volume on U.S. Highways and insufficient parking for commercial trucking vehicles has led to significant safety concerns for truck drivers. Hours of Service (HOS) regulations dictate driving and rest periods of truck drivers. When a truck driver must stop as designated by the HOS regulations and the nearest parking location is at capacity, the trucker must either continue driving past the HOS limit or park in an undesignated and possibly illegal or unsafe spot such as an off-ramp. The combination of these two variables play an important role in the safety of truck drivers on a …