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Full-Text Articles in Physics

A Human Powered Micro-Generator For Charging Electronic Devices, John Adam May 2018

A Human Powered Micro-Generator For Charging Electronic Devices, John Adam

Senior Theses

A hand-pulled generator has been designed and tested. A preliminary result has been obtained and discussed. This device was created to provide outlet-free charging. Electronic devices are useful when going out into the wilderness. A portable power supply is necessary to keep an electronic device alive. This project created a device that converts human energy into electricity to charge electronic devices. This thesis overviews the device’s design, build, and tests. Two different tests were run to determine that the device is capable of charging the storage battery. The device presented can provide 14 minutes of charging time with one hour …


Increasing The Longevity Of Tungsten Filaments In A Zone Refiner, Byron D. Greenlee May 2018

Increasing The Longevity Of Tungsten Filaments In A Zone Refiner, Byron D. Greenlee

Senior Theses

Zone refining is used for its ability to purify material and grow single crystals. To produce these single crystals, a suspended molten zone, generated by electron bombardment, passes along the polycrystalline stock. During a zone refining run, the filaments that produce the electron bombardment can fail. In this project, the longevity of tungsten filaments in a zone refiner was investigated. A new bombardment geometry was constructed to attempt to increase the longevity of the filaments. The new geometry had a shield machined into it to prevent line-of-sight impurities originating in the molten zone from striking the filaments. It was found …


Effects Of Tension On Resonant Frequencies Of Strings, Blake Burnett May 2018

Effects Of Tension On Resonant Frequencies Of Strings, Blake Burnett

Senior Theses

This project tests and explores resonance of strings. Since all materials and mechanisms are affected by vibrations, it is important to know the frequencies at which resonance occurs. To explore this subject, strings were used as a model material to test the effect tension has on resonance. The fundamental frequencies and the corresponding modes of resonance were used to analyze the data. The results of this experiment show that increasing tension on a string increases its resonance frequency. Understanding the physics behind resonance frequency allows systems to be designed to take advantage of resonance properties, or to avoid resonance where …


The Effects Of Surface Pace In Baseball, Jason Farlow May 2018

The Effects Of Surface Pace In Baseball, Jason Farlow

Senior Theses

A baseball travels across different surfaces at different paces. The goal of this experiment is to find a percentage difference in speeds the ball will reflect off a given surface. The energy lost on the turf surface was far more significant than on dirt surface as the turf lost an average of 26% of its energy as compared to just 16% of the energy on dirt. In the Northwest conference, teams play on four turf-based infields and five dirt-based infields. The results of this study suggest that kinetic friction forces are more significant in reducing ball rebound speed than in …


Thermoelectrics And Thermoelectric Devices, Benjamin T. Erck May 2018

Thermoelectrics And Thermoelectric Devices, Benjamin T. Erck

Senior Theses

The field of thermoelectrics has many applications, and more are found in everyday systems. From its current studies, it is apparent that improving the figure of merit zT (which defines a good thermoelectric material) is important in the effectiveness of power generation. Another important part of thermoelectrics is the duality of these devices. They can both move heat and generate power, depending on their role in the system. In this thesis research, a process was made to test these thermoelectric relationships for a few Peltier devices in order to understand their efficiencies and what systems they can be applied to.


Measuring The Double Layer Capacitance Of Electrolytes With Varied Concentrations, Geoffrey Rath May 2018

Measuring The Double Layer Capacitance Of Electrolytes With Varied Concentrations, Geoffrey Rath

Senior Theses

When electric potentials are applied from an electrolytic fluid to a metal, a double layer capacitor, Cdl, develops at the interface. The layer directly at the interface is called the Stern layer and has a thickness equal to roughly the size of the ions in the fluid. The next layer, the diffuse layer, arises from the gathering of like charges in the Stern layer. This layer is the distance needed for ionic charges to return to equilibrium. This distance, called the Debye length, λ, depends on the square root of the electrolyte concentration. To study the properties of …


The Drag Coefficient Of Varying Dimple Patterns, James M. Seeley, Michael S. Crosser May 2018

The Drag Coefficient Of Varying Dimple Patterns, James M. Seeley, Michael S. Crosser

Senior Theses

There are many golf balls on the market today with varying dimple sizes, shapes, and distribution. These proprietary differences are all designed to reduce drag on the balls during flight, allowing golfers to hit the ball farther distances. There are limited published studies comparing how varying the dimples affects the reduction of drag. An experiment was developed in which golf balls were pulled through a water tank to measure the drag force acting on each ball. The water was chosen to allow for testing at slower velocities than the typical necessary speeds to cause turbulence for balls traveling in air. …


The Computational Study Of Fly Swarms & Complexity, Austin Bebee May 2018

The Computational Study Of Fly Swarms & Complexity, Austin Bebee

Senior Theses

A system is considered complex if it is composed of individual parts that abide by their own set of rules, while the system, as a whole, will produce non-deterministic properties. This prevents the behavior of such systems from being accurately predicted. The motivation for studying complexity spurs from the fact that it is a fundamental aspect of innumerable systems. Among complex systems, fly swarms are relatively simple, but even so they are still not well understood. In this research, several computational models were developed to assist with the understanding of fly swarms. These models were primarily analyzed by using the …