Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

The Effects Of Oxygen Tension On Nitrate Reduction By Pseudomonas Isolate, Hao-Jan Hsing

Theses

It is a generally accepted concept that nitrate reduction only occurs under anaerobic conditions. Oxygen inhibits denitrification. However many studies of nitrate reduction under low oxygen tension have shown what has been called aerobic denitrification. This project examines the process of aerobic denitrification.

Oxgyen affects cell growth and the amount of nitrate utilized. When oxygen is absent, the cell growth rate is lower and nitrate utlization is higher then when oxygen is present.

Nitrate is reduced to nirite under anaerobic conditions. Nitrite accumulation did not continue increase. But increased then decreased producing a "Z" shaped graph when plotted.

Measurement Of The Removal Of Selected Vocs From A Municipal Treatment Plant, Hong Yu

Theses

Industrial wastewater contains a variety of volatile chemical constituents. The large majority of the volatiles are organics. Many of these volatile or¬ganic compounds (VOCs) end up in the effluent to wastewater treatment plants. It is necessary to estimate the emission of the VOCs from sewerage plants in order to study the fate of these volatile organic compounds.

This study focuses on the estimation and comparison of the emission of 28 volatile organic compounds from the water and air in four operation units of Linden Roselle Sewerage Authority (LRSA) wastewater treatment plant. The removal rates of these target compounds have been …

A Study In Systems Integration Architecture, Sashidhar M. Prasad

Theses

This Thesis studies the two architectures OSCA and ANSA which support the ODPSE principle in the first two parts. In the third part the framework for integrating these two architectures is described. The idea of integration architectures in relation to open architectures is studied using the enabling technologies.

Biomass Conversion Of Solid-Waste (Newsprint) Into A Clean Fuel (Ethanol) By Enzymic Hydrolysis And Fermentation, Nimesh V. Gandhi

Theses

A feasibility study has been performed with two bioprocesses for conversion of newsprint waste to an environmentally safe fuel (ethyl alcohol) and carbon dioxide.

The following areas were investigated to accomplish this task: one hour pretreatment of newsprint by attrition, saccharification of paper slurry to glucose by cellulase and cellobiase, effects of pH, temperature and concentration of enzymes on conversion of paper to sugar, fermentation of glucose to ethanol and carbon dioxide by immobilized yeast, and simultaneous saccharification and fermentation of paper to ethanol and carbon dioxide using enzymes and immobilized yeast.

Results indicate that the enzymic hydrolysis of newsprint …

Experiments In Aerobic And Anaerobic Biodegradation Of Trichloroethylene, Qiong Liao

Theses

The removal of trichloroethylene (TCE) from industrial waste has been intensively studied in recent years, Biodegradation has been determined to be an effective treatment for TCE in the environment. Many researchers have studied the biodegradation of TOE and obtained successful results based on the use of specific isolated bacteria. At the NJIT Biotechnology Laboratory, a new method is being developed in which immobilized activated sludge is used to degrade several toxic chemicals in various reactor configurations. The objective of this research is to determine if these methods can be extended to treat TCE.

Activated sludge from a wastewater treatment plant …

Work-Preserving Real-Time Emulation Of Meshes On Butterfly Networks, Alf-Christian Achilles

Theses

The emulation of a guest network G on a host network H is work-preserving and real-time if the inefficiency, that is the ratio W_G/W_H of the amounts of work done in both networks, and the slowdown of the emulation are O(1).

In this thesis we show that an infinite number of meshes can be emulated on a butterfly in a work-preserving real-time manner, despite the fact that any emulation of an s x s-node mesh in a butterfly with load 1 has a dilation of Ω(logs).

The recursive embedding of a mesh in a butterfly presented by …

Biodegradation Of Diflufenican Using Anaerobic Microbial Consortia, Velukumar T. Nanjagowder

Theses

In this thesis I examine the feasibility of using anaerobic microbial consortia from digested anaerobic sludge to degrade Diflufenican, a fluorinated herbicide released into the environment as a result of agricultural usage. The compound is manufactured by Rhone Poulenc and it is an active ingredient of agricultural herbicides. The anaerobic digested sludge served both as a source of microorganisms and as a growth medium. Initial studies were conducted by making a stock solution of 1 ppm concentration of Diflufenican in acetone, the optimal solubility of the compound as suggested in the material safety data sheet is 0.05 ppm in water. …

Low Pressure Chemical Vapor Deposition (Lpcvd) Of Silicon Carbide From Diethylsilane, Yi-Tong Shi

Theses

The depositions of amorphous and cubic-crystal SiC from a new chemical vapor deposition source, diethylsilane(DES), have been studied. Amorphous SiC thin films and crystalline cubic-SiC materials have been deposited on silicon wafers at temperature lower and higher than 850C, respectively. The activation energy and a reaction mechanism involving the production and subsequent desorption of diethylsilene has been suggested, which explains the observed deposition dependency with the temperature and reactor pressure. A model based on the polymerization of DES is offered and the deposition rate is found to be the result of a large number of simultaneously occuring deposition processes for …

Isolation And Characterization Of A Crude Extracellular Phenol Oxidase From A Recirculation Bioreactor, Yun Tang

Theses

The study of phenol biodegradation has been performed using calcium alginate entrapped activated sludge in a recirculation reactor. An effective recirculation reactor system may be used on the laboratory scale to produce phenol oxidase, Phenol oxidase was isolated and concentrated from the degradation solution of phenol by ultrafiltration and freeze-drying respectively,

The effects of various concentrations of phenol, pH, temperature, ionic strength, cations, anions and 2- chlorophenol were studied on the oxidation reaction of enzyme. The optimal conditions of activated sludge phenol oxidase are [phenol] = 100 ppm; pH = 6.0; temperature 37°C; ionic strength equivalent to 0.1 M Na …

Experiments In Aerobic And Anaerobic Biodegradation Of Methylene Chloride Using Activated Sludge, Vivek Chandrakant Sinkar

Theses

Biological removal of methylene chloride was studied under aerobic and anaerobic conditions using activated sludge cultures. Shaker flask experiments were conducted to test the ability of the microorganisms to degrade methylene chloride under aerobic conditions. Hydrogen peroxide was used a as source of dissolved oxygen to minimize physical removal of methylene chloride due to aeration. The effect of secondary substrates like glucose, cellulose acetate, ammonium acetate and nutrient broth on biodegradation of methylene chloride was studied. Biodegradation in the presence of surfactant and alkaline stress was also investigated.

No significant degradation was observed in all aerobic experiments.

Anaerobic sludge was …

Acid Recovery Of Cadmium And Lead From Immobilized Activated Sludge Used To Biosorb Metals, Chandrakanth Hartman

Theses

A study of the adsorption and subsequent desorption of heavy metals using various concentrations of hydrochloric acids has been performed.

To accomplish this task, the following areas were investigated : immobilization of the sludge, adsorption of heavy metals, various concentrations of acid used as stripping agents, examination of the relative fractions of heavy metals obtained using various stripping agents, and the actual concentration of the acid at a particular fraction.

It was observed that water helps in extraction of cadmium to a certain extent, but lead cannot be extracted with water. Also, water mixed with dilute hydrochloric acid is more …

Liquid-Vapor Equilibria And Henry's Law Constants For Volatile Organics In Surfactants, Qianping Peng

Theses

We present liquid vapor equilibria data and Henry's law constants for Methyl-ethyl Ketone, Toluene, Butyl Acetate, Acetone and i-Propanol in surfactants: Octylphenyl Decaethoxylate, Sorbitan Monooleate and Sodium Sulfonate at temperatures of 20 to 70 C.

The objective of this study is to determine the effect of applying surfactant absorption technique (neat surfactants) to volatile organic compounds (VOC's) for the removal of these species as organic vapors from air emission streams.

Liquid/vapor equilibrium data are presented as curves in several different ways:

i. Each individual VOC at four temperatures between 22 C to 70 C in the respective surfactants Octylpenyl Decaethoxylate, …

Catalytic Oxidation Of Trace Concentrations Of Chlorinated Hydrocarbons Over 1.5% Platinum On Alumina/Monolith, Yi Wang

Theses

The catalytic oxidation of chlorinated hydrocarbons CH₂Cl₂ (DCM) and C₂HCl₃ (TCE) was investigated over a 1.5% Pt on Al2O3/monolith at 150 to 450°C. The studies were conducted at space velocities from 1,000 v/v/hr to 30,000 v/v/hr. Chemical equilibrium calculations showed the potential conversion and products distribution. The reactivity and selectivity for destruction of these compounds with air over Pt catalyst were evaluated experimentally. This research was conducted in a tubular reactor system with associated feed and product flow measuring equipment. Feed and product streams were analyzed using gas chromatography (GC) with ECD, FID and …

Graphical User Interface For Image Processing, Kumar Chebrolu

Theses

A user friendly, menu driven, highly interactive X Windows package for Image Processing Applications using Motif Widget Set under Motif Window Manager is developed. Modules related to Segementation, Enhancement, Representation, Transformations are developed. The above routines are useful for image manipulation. The current gray scale/binary image is displayed on the window. Online histogram is provided so that the user can change the threshold value interactively. The OSF/Motif toolkit is used efficiently and also Xlib calls to display the image by allocating colormap. An on-line image manipulation help menu facility is incorparated in the tool to make it more versatile.

Methods Development For Determination Of Trace Polar Volatile Organics In Environmental Samples, Qingchu Peng

Theses

The determination of trace levels of organic compounds in water samples is well developed for the less polar compounds, but the polar compounds are more difficult. The development of reliable and reproducible methods for such compounds as volatile alcohols and ketones is necessary if environmental monitoring is to be extended to these compounds.

The purge-and-trap method is frequently used for determination of volatiles in water samples. The method has problems when hydrophylic substances are being analyzed, since these are less easy to purge from the solution and more difficult to trap and desorb quantitatively. The high amount of water carried …

Preparation And Testing Of Novel Dental Adhesives Based On Bis- Gma/Tegdma Monomer System, Deyun Sun

Theses

In this study, polymerizable phosphonate adhesives synthesized from Diethylchloro-phosphate and 2-Hydroxyethylmethylacrylate and formulated with G-methacryloxy-propyltrimethoxy silane is used in Bis-GMA/TEGDMA monomer system. All the raw materials and finished products are characterized with infrared spectra, vapor pressure osmometry, viscosity and gel test. The bonding strength to tooth materials is determined by Instron machine. The work emphasizes applying polymeric organic phosphonate adhesive to Bis-GMA/TEGDMA monomer system and investigates the appropriate conditions for the crosslinking of Bis-GMA/TEGDMA monomer system. Average bonding strength of 744 psi to enamel and 600 to dentine are ob¬tained in comparision to 550 psi to enamel for phosphonate/silane/MMA/PMMA and …

Experiments With The Gap Variation Of Interpolation Search For Semi Uniform Distributed Alphabetic Files, Jatin M. Bhavsar

Theses

There are various techniques for searching a data from a data base. One of them is interpolation search. It works on uniformly distributed and sorted numerical tables and considered to be one of the fastest methods. On an average this method takes 'lg lg n'

Burton and Lewis [BL] shows the inefficiency of interpolation sarch for an alphabetic table whose distribution is not known or non-uniform. They introduce GAP variations of interpolation search to compare the inefficiency. However another approach to a non-uniform is to apply the cumulative distribution function F which transfer a non-uniform distribution to uniform one, for …

The Performance Of Training Pattern Sets In A New Art-Based Neural Architecture For Image Enhancement, Fu-Chun Chang

Theses

Neural network can be applied on the image enhancement after adding another two layers into the Adaptive Resonance Theory architectures (ART 1). The analysis for selecting a nice training pattern set associate the appropriate vigilance values is the main concerns in this thesis. For a single training pattern ,the network can act as a mathematical morphology operators such as erosion , dilation, opening and closing. With more than one training patterns in the network, 16 experiments are tested and are compared to each other in order to find the best selection for doing the image enhancement work. With both the …

Biological Coal Desulfurization, Ming Le

Theses

Sulfur removal from coal before combustion is of considerable interest to avoid emission of oxides of sulfur(SO_x). Chemical and physical methods have been developed for removing the inorganic sulfur component in coal. This component is generally associated with pyrites(FeS2). However, no commerical methods have been developed for the removal of the organic sulfur conponent. This study describes microbial methods for removing organically bound sulfur from coal. The specific goals of this study were to ascertain whether a robust biologically active population such as activated sludge biomass can remove organic sulfur from coal and to devise sulfur analytical methods …

Biodegradation Of Styrene In A Recirculation Reactor Using Immobilized Activated Sludge, Shreyans Dilip Shah

Theses

The performance of immobilized cells in the biological treatment of hazardous waste was investigated using a recirculating flow reactor in batch mode. A mixed culture activated sludge from a municipal waste water treatment plant was immobilized in calcium alginate gel, The bio-oxidation ability of these microbes towards a model toxin (styrene) was studied under closed system using dilute H₂O₂ solution as an oxygen source.
The process parameters studied were as follows:

1. Effect of flow rate of recycle stream,
2. Effect of biomass loading,
3. Effect of spiking concentration of styrene, and
4. Flow pattern and average residence time within the …

Microwave Treatment Of Hazardous Wastes : Chemical Fixation Of Insoluble Non-Volatile, Chemically Non-Reactive Organics In Soil, Naihong Zhu

Theses

Microwave treatment of hazardous wastes like dioxin-contaminated soil potentially fills a great need for a remediation technology which potentially can be applied in-situ: the EPA has concluded from a risk assessment study that it is the excavation and transportation of such wastes that poses the greatest risk. Studies have been carried out on a surrogate for dioxin, namely, 9,10-anthraquinone because it has similar chemical and physical properties but it is not toxic. It was found in microwave treatment studies that, at temperatures attainable in-situ, anthraquinone became non-extractable. A model was proposed which postulated that as water was removed from soil …

Investigations Of Substitution Of Bi And Tl For Rare Earth Elements In Superconducting Rba2cu3oy, Jian Tang

Theses

Substitution of some other elements for rare earth or yttrium in high-T_c superconducting RBa₂Cu₃O_y compounds (R = Y, Nd, etc.) may improve chemical and physical properties of the materials, shed light on the superconducting mechanism of the new materials, and help to find new superconducting materials with even higher transition temperatures.

Bi³⁺ and Tl³⁺ have been reported earlier to result in higher T_c's in the related layer-structure compounds. The effect of electronegativity on superconductivity could be studied if substitution of Bi or Tl for Y or other rare earth elements …

Analysis Of Chemical Contaminants In Tissue Samples From Two Species Of Fish, Michael David Reive

Theses

Interaction of marine species with chemical pollutants within the marine ecosystem is extremely complex and difficult to interpret. The purpose of this thesis was to investigate the effect of an exposure of treated municipal wastewater on winter flounder (Pseudopleuronectes americanus) and striped bass (Morone saxatilis). Fish from two locations were exposed to different concentrations of wastewater. Half of the fish from each tank were sacrificed, and the remaining fish were given a depuration period in unpolluted water. Tissue samples were composited, soxhlet extracted and passed through a florisil cleanup column. Gas chromatography, was used to analyze for hexachlorobenzene, hexachlorobutadiene, Aroclor …