Digital Commons Network^™

Strategic Management And Entrepreneurship As Economic Development Tools, Norbert Ziemer

Doctoral Dissertations

This research develops a framework of Biobased Entrepreneurial Ventures for Rural Economic Development. Rural economic development poses unique challenges and opportunities, based on available production assets, workforce trends like "brain drain," and access to industry clusters. However, certain entrepreneurial venture opportunities are preferable for rural economic development. Since supply chains are vital to business success, initial emphasis is placed on the biomass resource base to be transformed through entrepreneurial activity into higher economic value outputs. The literature contains research on specific opportunities in rural economic development (e.g. ethanol, wind power). Many of these are limited in scope and depend on …

Mobispatial: Open Source For Mobile Spatial Interaction, Junjun Yin, James Carswell

Conference papers

This paper describes our Mobile Spatial Interaction (MSI) prototype MobiSpatial, which benefits from location and orientation aware smartphones and existing open source spatial data initiatives to facilitate user interaction with the geospatial query process. We utilize today’s ubiquitous mobile device as the central computing platform to calculate a mobile user’s visibility shape at his/her current location. MobiSpatial uses this shape as a query “window” in a spatial database to perform line-of-sight, field-of-view and 360º Isovist visibility searches. These visibility based spatial queries reduce the risk of “information overload” by exploiting “hidden query removal” functionality to retrieve only those objects that …

Incorporating The Delphi Technique To Investigate Renewable Energy Technology Transfer In Saudi Arabia, Nasir K. Al-Otaibi

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

Saudi Arabia is a major oil-producing nation facing a rapidly-growing population, high unemployment, climate change, and the depletion of its natural resources, potentially including its oil supply. Technology transfer is regarded as a means to diversify countries' economies beyond their natural resources. This dissertation examined the opportunities and barriers to utilizing technology transfer successfully to build renewable energy resources in Saudi Arabia to diversify the economy beyond oil production. Examples of other developing countries that have successfully used technology transfer to transform their economies are explored, including Japan, Malayasia, and the United Arab Emirates. Brazil is presented as a detailed …

Overview Of The 2010 Carbonaceous Aerosols And Radiative Effects Study (Cares), Rahul A. Zaveri, William J. Shaw, Daniel J. Cziczo, Beat Schmid, Richard Ferrare, M. Lizabeth Alexander, Raul Alvarez, W. Patrick Arnott, Dean B. Atkinson, Sunil Baidar, Robert M. Banta, James Barnard, Josef Beranek, Larry K. Berg, Fred Brechtel, W. Alan Brewer, John F. Cahill, Brian Cairns, Christopher D. Cappa, D. Chand, S. China, Jennifer M. Comstock, Manvendra K. Dubey, Robert C. Easter, M. H. Erickson, Jerome Fast, Cody Floerchinger, B. Flowers, Edward C. Fortner, Jeffrey S. Gaffney, Mary K. Gilles, Kyle Gorkowski, William Gustafson, Madhu Gyawali, J. Hair, R. M. Hardesty, Joseph Harworth, Scott C. Herndon, Naruki Hiranuma, Chris Hostetler, John M. Hubbe, John T. Jayne, H. Jeong, B. Tom Jobson, Evgueni Kassianov, Lawrence I. Kleinman, C. Kluzek, W. Berk Knighton, Katheryn R. Kolesar, Chongai Kuang, Alena Kubátová, Andrew O. Langford, Alexander Laskin, N. Laulainen, Richard D. Marchbanks, Claudio Mazzoleni, Fan Mei, Ryan C. Moffet, Dan Nelson, Michael Obland, Hilke Oetjen, Timothy B. Onasch, I. Ortega, Matteo Ottaviani, Mikhail Pekour, Kimberly A. Prather, James Gregory Radney, Raymond R. Rogers, Scott P. Sandberg, Arthur J. Sedlacek, Christoph J. Senff, Gunnar I. Senum, Ari Setyan, John E. Shilling, Manishkumar Shrivastava, C. Song, Stephen R. Springston, R. Subramanian, Kaitlyn Suski, Jason Tomlinson, Rainer M. Volkamer, H. W. Wallace, Jian Wang, A. M. Weickmann, Douglas R. Worsnop, Xiao-Ying Yu, Alla Zelenyuk, Qi Zhang

Chemistry Faculty Publications and Presentations

Substantial uncertainties still exist in the scientific understanding of the possible interactions between urban and natural (biogenic) emissions in the production and transformation of atmospheric aerosol and the resulting impact on climate change. The US Department of Energy (DOE) Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) program’s Carbonaceous Aerosol and Radiative Effects Study (CARES) carried out in June 2010 in Central Valley, California, was a comprehensive effort designed to improve this understanding. The primary objective of the field study was to investigate the evolution of secondary organic and black carbon aerosols and their climate-related properties in the Sacramento urban plume as it was …

A Comparative Evaluation Of An Educational Program Designed To Enable Mechanical Engineering Students To Develop Global Competence, Aaron Gerald Ball

Theses and Dissertations

The 'flattening of the world', using Thomas Friedman's phraseology, is driving corporations to increasingly use collaborative engineering processes and global teams to operate on a global scale. Globalization of the traditional university engineering curriculum is necessary to help students prepare to work in a global environment. More scalable and economically sustainable program types are needed to enable the majority of students to obtain a globalized education. The purpose of this research was to determine how effectively a global team- and project-based computer aided engineering course provided learning opportunities that enabled students to develop elements of global competence in comparison to …

Adapting To Climate Change While Planning For Disaster: Footholds, Rope Lines, And The Iowa Floods, Robert R.M. Verchick, Abby Hall

BYU Law Review

No abstract provided.

The Development Of A Phase Locked Excitation Testing Method For Full‐Scale Wind Turbine Blades, Waleed Fathi Gowharji

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Full scale blade testing provides blade manufacturers with quantitative data regarding their blade design, manufacturing processes and durability. Structural fatigue tests are designed to assess the structural health of the turbine blade as well as simulate a lifespan worth of damage in a laboratory environment. These tests also provide a further understanding of the dynamics involved in modern turbine blades. Blade tests are typically conducted in one of the following manners: a dual-axis forced displacement, single axis or dual axis resonant configurations. Historically, fatigue testing has been performed by utilizing forced displacement systems. These systems do not allow for the …

Sensitivity Analysis On Mapping Evapotranspiration At High Resolution Using Internal Calibration (Metric), Venkata Naga Ravi Kumar Choragudi

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Mapping EvapoTranspiration at high Resolution using Internal Calibration (METRIC) is most widely used to quantify evapotranspiration (ET) spatially and temporally. It is essential to inspect the model’s response to errors in various parameters used in the model. Landsat 5 images from May 30 2009, July 1 2009 and a Landsat 7 image from September 27 2009 are used in this study. Fourteen different fields composed of Corn, Soybeans, Alfalfa are randomly chosen for each crop type.

Two kinds of errors are addressed in this study. One, with the errors that are transferred and potentially compensated by calibration (Global error) and …

Future Flooding Impacts On Transportation Infrastructure And Traffic Patterns Resulting From Climate Change, Heejun Chang, Martin Lafrenz, Il-Won Jung, Miguel A. Figliozzi, Rolando Melgoza, David Ruelas, Deena Platman, Cindy Pederson

Geography Faculty Publications and Presentations

This study investigated potential impacts of climate change on travel disruption resulting from road closures in two urban watersheds in the Portland metropolitan area. We used ensemble climate change scenarios, a hydrologic model, stream channel survey, a hydraulic model, and a travel forecast model to develop an integrated impact assessment method. High-resolution climate change scenarios are based on the combinations of two emission scenarios and eight general circulation models. The Precipitation-Runoff Modeling System was calibrated and validated for the period 1988-2006, and simulated for determining the probability of floods from 2020-2049. We surveyed stream cross sections at five road crossings …

Signquote: A Remote Testing Facility For Eliciting Signed Qualitative Feedback, Jerry Schnepp, Rosalee Wolfe, Brent Shiver, John Mcdonald, Jorge Toro

Visual Communications and Technology Education Faculty Publications

Sign synthesis is still an evolving technology and improving it requires the elicitation of qualitative feedback from users. Current options for acquiring qualitative feedback are limited. Face-toface tests conducted in sign language are expensive. On the other hand, remote tests do not use the preferred language of the test participants. A new tool, SignQUOTE, (Signed Qualitative Usability Online Testing Environment) is a configurable, cross platform remote testing system based entirely on sign language. It includes an innovative method for capturing qualitative feedback in sign language via webcam. In a comparison study, participants viewed animations of American Sign Language and gave …

Remote Sensing Of Soil Moisture Using Airborne Hyperspectral Data, Michael Finn, Mark Lewis, David Bosch, Mario Giraldo, Kristina Yamamoto, Dana Sullivan, Russell Kincaid, Ronaldo Luna, Gopala Allam, Craig Kvien, Michael Williams

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Landscape assessment of soil moisture is critical to understanding the hydrological cycle at the regional scale and in broad-scale studies of biophysical processes affected by global climate changes in temperature and precipitation. Traditional efforts to measure soil moisture have been principally restricted to in situ measurements, so remote sensing techniques are often employed. Hyperspectral sensors with finer spatial resolution and narrow band widths may offer an alternative to traditional multispectral analysis of soil moisture, particularly in landscapes with high spatial heterogeneity. This preliminary research evaluates the ability of remotely sensed hyperspectral data to quantify soil moisture for the Little River …

Model For Predicting The Impact Upon Economic Development Resulting From Highway Improvement Projects, Eric Thompson, Kanou Comlavi, Mallory Dimmit

Nebraska Department of Transportation: Research Reports

The Nebraska Department of Roads (NDOR) has an interest in integrating state economic development impact as another factor in prioritizing transportation investments. Such efforts require the development of a comprehensive model that can be used to estimate a consistent final measure of economic development impact that can be readily integrated into existing prioritization formulas. This report summarizes the efforts of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Bureau of Business Research (UNL-BBR) to develop such a model, by measuring the impact of expressway, viaduct, and other major investments projects around the state. Specifically, UNL-BBR developed an economic model to predict the economic impact …

A Google Earth-Based Framework For Visualization Of The Chesapeake Bay Operational Forecast System, Gary Lawson

Computational Modeling & Simulation Engineering Theses & Dissertations

For the persons who live near and travel the waters of the Chesapeake Bay, the data provided by the Chesapeake Bay Operational Forecast System (CBOFS) is invaluable. The information provided includes measurements and forecasts of surface wind velocity, water current velocity, salinity levels, water level, and temperature. Currently, this information is freely available on the CBQ_FS website hosted by the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). It is offered as Nowcast, measured data, and Forecast data and is visualized using 2D images which describe a subset of the data in an easy to read chart. However, if the data were …

Electric Vehicle Battery - Wind Energy Storage System, Steven K. Srivastava, Gary Nola

Green Manufacturing Research Journal

The proposed concept utilizes the EV battery waste stream as a means to store wind energy in order to increase wind energy capacity factor, improve utilization, and make more efficient use of EV batteries prior to recycling. Michigan is an ideal location for such a facility because many of the battery and automotive manufacturers are located here. A 200 MW wind farm can charge a battery farm which consists of all reject and post-consumer batteries and all EVs located in Michigan by 2015. Michigan is on track to meet a 10% renewable portfolio by 2015 with over 1100 MW of …

Assessing Near-Field Black Carbon Variability Due To Wood Burning And Evaluating Regression Models And Isc Dispersion Modeling, Stella Tan

Master's Theses

PM_2.5 variability within the neighborhood scale has not been thoroughly studied for wood burning communities. High variability in near-field PM_2.5 concentration may lead to harmful public exposure since monitoring does not occur on that scale. This study measures near-field PM_2.5 variability by measuring black carbon (BC), a component of PM_2.5, in a 1 km² area located in Cambria, California. BC and meteorological data (when meteorological instruments were available) were measured over thirteen 12-hour intensive operation periods (IOPs) occurring over the winters of 2009 and 2010. Near-field BC variability was measured to understand the type …

Analysis Of Migration Models Of Biogeography-Based Optimization Using Markov Theory, Haiping Ma, Daniel J. Simon

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Biogeography-based optimization (BBO) is a new evolutionary algorithm inspired by biogeography, which involves the study of the migration of biological species between habitats. Previous work has shown that various migration models of BBO result in significant changes in performance. Sinusoidal migration models have been shown to provide the best performance so far. Motivated by biogeography theory and previous results, in this paper a generalized sinusoidal migration model curve is proposed. A previously derived BBO Markov model is used to analyze the effect of migration models on optimization performance, and new theoretical results which are confirmed with simulation results are obtained. …

Successful Engineering And Technology Student Mobility: Key Student Perspectives And Quality Determinants Before, During And After Student Exchange Under The Atlantis Programme, Mike Murphy, Donal Mchale, Michael Dyrenfurth

Conference papers

In this paper, we describe the lessons learned, and determinants of quality, from two Atlantis programmes. Additionally our two student authors will share key student perspectives relevant to student mobility: (1) before they visited the partner university, (2) while they were studying at the partner university and (3) after they returned to their home university. Purdue University and the Technological University Dublin, together with the Hochschule Darmstadt and Pennsylvania State University, were successful in securing an Atlantis mobility grant [1] for four years to support student and staff mobility between the United States and Europe. The programme has just completed …

Observations Of The Wind Resource Across The Dublin Urban Area, Keith Sunderland, Michael Conlon, Gerald Mills, Rowan Feely

Conference papers

This paper presents an investigation of wind observations made at three (of a network of ten) stations in Dublin. Two of the stations are located over different parts of the urbanized landscape and one is located at Dublin Airport, which exemplifies a typical meteorological station. The purpose of the analysis is to evaluate the nature of the wind resource in the urban area. The potential output of a range of commercially available micro wind turbines at one of the stations is considered. At this location, an anemometer is mounted in a similar manner to international examples of building mounted domestic …

Planned Tournament Selection, Douglas Mccorkle, Daniel Ashlock, Steven Corns, Kenneth Mark Bryden

Engineering Management and Systems Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Tournament selection is a versatile method of selection and replacement used in evolutionary computation. Normally tournaments are chosen uniformly at random. This study demonstrates the effectiveness of planning tournaments in advance to control information flow within a population being evolved for optimization. Tests are performed on a variety of evolutionary test problems, finding that different planned tournament schemes yield significant differences in performance. the correct type of planned tournament is found to be problem dependent. in addition to a linear-function scheme for planning tournaments, this study also introduces a technique called multi-deme planned tournaments selection which permits simpler cases of …

On The Effects Of Graph Based Evolutionary Algorithms For Training Finite State Classifiers, Steven M. Corns

Engineering Management and Systems Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This work presents a method for evolving finite state machines for the classification of polymerase chain reaction primers in mice using graph based evolutionary algorithms. using these machine learning tools we can compensate for many lab, organism, and chemical specific factors that can cause these primers to fail. using Finite State Classifiers can help to decrease the number of primers that fail to amplify correctly. for training these classifiers, fifteen different graph based evolutionary algorithms were used in two different experiments to explore the effects of diversity preservation on the development of these classifiers. by controlling the rate at which …

Water, Jane Qiong Zhang, Linda Vanasupa

Materials Engineering

This document is a set of learning materials to support the teaching of water issues particularly related to sustainability in engineering. It is designed for the general engineering or science audience. Its design is based on the framework of the Fink Taxonomy of Significant Learning. The document is a fully-editable set of slides in open source format (pptx) that includes references to targeted learning objectives on each slide and annotations in the notes section of each slide.

A Field And Modeling Assessment Of Methyl Mercury Accumulation In An Engineered Retention Pond, Lauren C. Blazeck

Master's Theses

The accumulation of methyl mercury (MeHg) in lakes during summer stratification has been demonstrated to affect biotic mercury (Hg) accumulation. However, small, shallow polymictic lakes can experience short-term stratification and mixing events that are largely unstudied in their abilities to affect Hg cycling and MeHg accumulation. Short-term stratification events and changing lake characteristics impact lake biogeochemical cycles, and therefore, MeHg production and transport. A field and modeling analysis was performed on a small suburban lake located on the University of Connecticut campus to determine the impact of lake characteristics on the potential for MeHg accumulation. MeHg concentrations ranged from non-detect …

An Integrated Quantitative Risk Analysis Method For Major Construction Accidents Using Fuzzy Concepts And Influence Diagram, Yong-Huang Lin, Chen-Chung Lin, Yaw-Yauan Tyan

Journal of Marine Science and Technology–Taiwan

The accident factor identification and risk assessment is an essential requirement for prevention of major construction accidents in the construction project process. An integrated quantitative risk assessment (IQRA) method has been proposed in this paper to overcome the problems of difficult to quantify accident probability for construction industry. The proposed approach employs influence diagram and fuzzy theory to estimate accident probability and to deal with the imprecision inherent to the process of subjective judgment. A case study that evaluates accident probability of diaphragm wall collapse is presented to illustrate the use of this methodology and to demonstrate its capability.

Decisive Disaster Debris Management, Nazli Yesiller

Civil and Environmental Engineering

No abstract provided.

Assessing The Effects Of Climate Change And Addressing Solutions At L. F. Wade International Airport, Bermuda, Sebastian Romeo Phillip Brisson

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The purpose of this thesis was to find how past trends and future predictions of climate change and associated factors would affect airport operations at the L. F. Wade International Airport. The Government of Bermuda's plans to build a new terminal were also analyzed to determine potential impacts. Predicted future trends of sea level rise and hurricane activity were assessed by analyzing previous occurrences and studies and depicted using GIS mapping data. Risk of storm surge to the L. F. Wade International Airport has become apparent, especially after Hurricane Fabian of 2003. The results of this study suggest that the …

Metaheuristics For Hub Location Models, Ornurai Sangsawang

All Dissertations

In this research, we propose metaheuristics for solving two p-hub median problems.. The first p-hub median problem, which is NP-hard, is the uncapacitated single p-hub median problem (USApHMP). In this problem, metaheuristics such as genetic algorithms, simulated annealing and tabu search, are applied in different types of representations. Caching is also
applied to speed up computational time of the algorithms. The results clearly demonstrate that tabu search with a permutation solution representation, augmented with caching is the highest performing method, both in terms of solution quality and computational time among these algorithms for the USApHMP. We also investigate the performance …

Evaluation Of Safe Routes To School Programs: Qualitative And Quantitative Analysis Of Parental Decision-Making, Lynn Weigand, Noreen Mcdonald

TREC Final Reports

In the United States, walking to school declined from 42% of 5-18 year olds in 1969 to 16% in 20011. The US Department of Transportation has responded to this dramatic decrease by funding the Safe Routes to School program for $612 million in SAFETEA-LU. The program’s funding emphasize infrastructure improvements such as completing sidewalks and adding crosswalks by requiring between 70% and 90% of funding be allocated toward infrastructure. However, recent research shows that 2 of 3 children who currently are driven to school, but live close enough to walk, do so because it is more convenient for parents. Currently, …

Bs News July/August

Building Services Engineering

No abstract provided.

Automatic High-Fidelity 3d Road Network Modeling, Jie Wang

Computational Modeling & Simulation Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Many computer applications such as racing games and driving simulations frequently make use of 3D high-fidelity road network models for a variety of purposes. However, there are very few existing methods for automatic generation of 3D realistic road networks, especially for those in the real world. On the other hand, vast road network GIS data have been collected in the past and used by a wide range of applications, such as navigation and evaluation. A method that can automatically produce 3D high-fidelity road network models from 2D real road GIS data will significantly reduce both the labor and time needed …

Social Innovation Concepts At Nasa: Integrating International Development Challenges And Hands-On Prototyping With Spacecraft Design Training, Leonard Yowell, Evan A. Thomas

Mechanical and Materials Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

The NASA Johnson Space Center Social Innovation program has been designed to encourage innovation within the NASA community that benefits both NASA's core mission as well as human needs domestically and internationally. By encouraging internal and external collaboration and providing resources including the new Johnson Space Center "Sandbox" design shop, new innovations are anticipated. Technologies developed for the human exploration of space share similar requirements with appropriate technology for the developing world. The technology goals of keeping people alive in a difficult environment involve addressing requirements for low maintenance and robustness and often include using renewable energy sources. Technologies developed …