Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Image Compression By Wavelet Transform., Panrong Xiao

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Digital images are widely used in computer applications. Uncompressed digital images require considerable storage capacity and transmission bandwidth. Efficient image compression solutions are becoming more critical with the recent growth of data intensive, multimedia-based web applications.

This thesis studies image compression with wavelet transforms. As a necessary background, the basic concepts of graphical image storage and currently used compression algorithms are discussed. The mathematical properties of several types of wavelets, including Haar, Daubechies, and biorthogonal spline wavelets are covered and the Enbedded Zerotree Wavelet (EZW) coding algorithm is introduced. The last part of the thesis analyzes the compression results to …

A Meta-Analysis And Risk Assessment Of Heavy Metal Uptake In Common Garden Vegetables., Trent David Lecoultre

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Peer reviewed literature was searched to identify research pertaining to the uptake of heavy metals (As, Cd, Pb and Zn) by vegetables (cabbage, carrot, lettuce, and radish). The objectives of this research were to 1) determine the relationship between heavy metal concentrations in the soil and heavy metal concentrations in vegetables, and 2) determine the level of risk associated with exposure to heavy metals through ingestion of contaminated vegetables. Highly variable estimates and biologically implausible regression equations resulted from this meta-analysis. Exposure to arsenic through the ingestion of lettuce grown on contaminated soil significantly increases cancer risk, especially in children. …

Hazardous Materials Transportation Flow Survey: An Evaluation Of Hazardous Materials Transported In Washington County., Daniel John O'Brien

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study examines the transportation of hazardous materials through Washington County, Tennessee. This study incorporates federal, state, and local data in assessing current transportation trends. Data gathering activities included local chemical inventories, hazardous materials transportation flow surveys, hazardous materials rail transportation trends, and hazardous materials incident data.

All data were compiled and then analyzed to identify hazardous materials transportation trends in Washington County, Tennessee. This information is pertinent to emergency planners for the preparation of hazardous materials transportation incidents. The data gathered further revealed the need for this type of study to identify changing trends in the transportation of hazardous …

Life Annuities Under Random Rates Of Interest., Lesley J. Baker

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

We begin by examining the accumulated value functions of some annuities-certain. We then investigate the accumulated value of these annuities where the interest is a random variable under some restrictions. Calculations are derived for the expected value and the variance of these accumulated values and present values. In particular we will examine an annuity-due of k yearly payments of 1. Then we will consider an increasing annuity-due of k yearly payments of 1, 2, ⋯ , k. And finally, we examine a decreasing annuity-due of k yearly payments of n, n - 1, ⋯ , n - k …

Investigation Of Perceptions Of Environmental Management Systems And Its Perceived Importance In A Corporation Undergoing Iso 14001 Certification., Charlette Michelle Clark

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The International Organization of Standardization (ISO) has created a series of voluntary standards (ISO 14000) which promote waste reduction and improve businesses’ environmental management. ISO 14001 is the Environmental Management System portion of ISO 14000 requiring employee awareness and involvement. The Robert Bosch Corporation is undergoing ISO 14001 certification.

In this study, a 23-question survey was used to evaluate Bosch employees’ awareness of ISO 14000 and their support of a waste reduction program at four plants (Johnson City, TN; Sumter, South Carolina; Ashland, Ohio; and South Bend, Indiana). Employees surveyed were not yet familiar with ISO 14000 and that their …

Synthesis And Use Of Chiral Surfactants., Xiaoye Yang

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

It has been previously shown that micelles formed from surfactants with chiral head groups serve to induce a chiral reaction medium, leading to enhanced enantioselectivities in the reaction products. This utilization of chiral surfactants will offer an economical alternative to traditional chial solvents while simultaneously reducing organic waste. We have successfully dimethlated S-leucinol in an 85% yield, and have synthesized a hydrocarbon-based surfactant with this molecule as a head group. We have also formed polymeric surfactants that have polydimethylsiloxane as the hydrophobic portion with the (S)-dimethylleucinol as a head group. Tests of the solubility of these surfactants have been conducted. …

Using Software Engineering Metrics In Ap Modularization., Kwaku Owusu-Tieku

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Significant amount of work has been done in software engineering in terms of reuse. With the use of object-orientation and design patterns that support the development of reusable modules, it appears that the development and reuse of software modules in creating new systems is becoming more and more common. The software engineering world, however has taken reuse more seriously than database; more research and improvement in reuse has been made in software engineering than in database. This paper investigates how software engineering metrics can be applied in the development of reusable database modules. This research provides a model for predicting …

Theoretical Study On The Mechanism Of Removing Nitrogen Oxides Using Isocyanic Acid., Taraneh Nowroozi-Isfahani

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The mechanism of RAPRENO_x reactions - RAPid REduction of Nitrogen Oxides using Isocyanic acid - proposed by Robert A. Perry¹ in an attempt to help control the emission of nitrogen oxides pollutant into the atmosphere, has been re-investigated theoretically. The study of reaction mechanisms was carried out using Chemist software². All mathematically possible elementary steps have been evaluated and the chemically reasonable ones have been considered to propose new sets of reaction mechanisms. Density Functional Theory (B3LYP/6-31 G**) calculations using Gaussian 98³ were made in order to study the relative energies of all species and …

Leveraging Test Measurements Into Proposing Additional Domain Tests., Radhika Turlapati

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Accuracy and efficiency are extremely critical factors for large real-time control applications. A small oversight can cause catastrophic failure of a real-time system. Thus, these applications have to be tested meticulously to prevent any catastrophe that might occur. But, testing these applications exhaustively is not tractable, mainly due to the inherent complexity of the applications and also the huge amount of inputs and outputs that these applications involve. In order to save valuable amounts of time and resources, automated testing is imperative. Also, quantitative metrics have to be provided that assess the existing quality of the system and help increase …

A Dendrochemical Analysis Of Lead, Aluminum, And Calcium In Southern Appalachian American Beech., Laura Suzanne Southerland

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The health of the northern hardwood forest in the Southern Appalachian Mountains of Tennessee, North Carolina, and Virginia has recently gained attention from the media and environmental stakeholders. This project was designed to examine concentrations of metals, including lead, aluminum, and calcium in growth rings of an important northern hardwood species, American beech (Fagus grandifolia Ehrh.) at Mount Rogers and Whitetop Mountain, Virginia. Dominant and codominant trees were sampled from sixteen research plots located at two different elevations. Samples were crossdated, divided into sections of ten-year periods, and analyzed using atomic absorption spectroscopy. Concentrations of metals were negatively correlated …

Integration Of Student Academic Record And Major Requirements Through Xml., Zhujun Hou

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this thesis is to develop a software application based on previous studies by 1997 Oak Ridge Design Studio Team that matches students' progress with major requirements in their college career. This study addresses the problems of previous studies and suggests a solution. A powerful new technique, XML, is used to model, store and process the data of major requirements and student records. This application produces an HTML file that provides detailed information of a student's academic progress towards graduation.

Explorations In The Classification Of Vertices As Good Or Bad., Eugenie Marie Jackson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

For a graph G, a set S is a dominating set if every vertex in V-S has a neighbor in S. A vertex contained in some minimum dominating set is called good; otherwise it is bad. A graph G has g(G) good vertices and b(G) bad vertices. The relationship between the order of G and g(G) assigns the graph to one of four classes.

Our results include a method of classifying caterpillars. Further, we develop realizability conditions for a graph G given a triple of nonnegative integers …

A Data Layout Descriptor Language (Ladel)., Ashfaq Ahmed Jeelani

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

To transfer data between devices and main memory, standard C block I/O interfaces use block buffers of type char. C++ programs that perform block I/O commonly use typecasting to move data between structures and block buffers. The subject of this thesis, the layout description language (LADEL), represents a high-level solution to the problem of block buffer management. LADEL provides operators that hide the casting ordinarily required to pack and to unpack buffers and guard against overflow of the virtual fields. LADEL also allows a programmer to dynamically define a structured view of a block buffer's contents. This view includes the …

Quantitative Analysis Of Domain Testing Effectiveness., Narendra Koneru

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The criticality of the applications modeled by the real-time software places stringent requirements on software quality before deploying into real use. Though automated test tools can be used to run a large number of tests efficiently, the functionality of any test tool is not complege without providing a means for analyzing the test results to determine potential problem sub-domains and sub-domains that need to be covered, and estimating the reliability of the modeled system.

This thesis outlines a solution strategy and implementation of that strategy for deriving quantitative metrics from domain testing of real-time control software tested via simulation. The …

Distribution List Maker Program With Inter-User Capabilities Between Universities And Colleges In The Tennessee Board Of Regents School System., Allan Richard Anderson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

E-mail is an important tool for faculty and staff at the university, college, department, and instructor levels. E-mail is a useful medium in the academic setting for corresponding at all levels. Instructors e-mail students about assignments, lectures, and urgent information: for example, postponed classes and changes in the schedule. In addition e-mail is used to let potential students know about job opportunities. Other routine uses for e-mail include group communications within academic committees and groups of students collaborating on projects.

Most users of e-mail who send messages to multiple recipients enter each recipients e-mail address into the TO: field individually …

Radical P-Chains In L3(2)., Donald Dewayne Belcher

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The McKay-Alperin-Dade Conjecture, which has not been finally verified, predicts the number of complex irreducible characters in various p-blocks of a finite group G as an alternating sum of the numbers of characters in related p-blocks of certain subgroups of G. The sub-groups involved are the normalizers of representatives of conjugacy classes of radical p-chains of G. For this reason, it is of interest to study radical p-chains. In this thesis, we examine the group L₃(2) and determine representatives of the conjugacy classes of radical p-subgroups and radical p-chains for …