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University Of Nevada, Las Vegas Transmutation Research Program Annual Progress Report Academic Year 2007-2008, Anthony Hechanova, Rebecca Paulson

Transmutation Research Program Reports (TRP)

It is my pleasure to present the UNLV Transmutation Research Program’s seventh annual report that highlights the academic year 2007-2008. Supporting this document are the many technical reports and theses that have been generated over the past seven years.

In the seventh year of our program, we continued to see growth in the Radiochemistry Ph.D. program with a total of 20 students in the fourth year of the program (we anticipated twelve in the program proposal). Since our inception, the program has sponsored to their conclusion 48 M.S. and 6 Ph.D. degrees. The program supported 53 graduate students, 11 undergraduates, …

Biomimetic Self -Assembled Nanomatrix For Bone Tissue Regeneration, Joel M. Anderson

All ETDs from UAB

Bone is a dense, connective tissue with an extracellular matrix (ECM) comprised of biological and organic/inorganic biphasic matrices. For this study, novel peptide amphiphile (PA) nanomatrices were synthesized to mimic the native bone ECM and evaluated with human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs) isolated from bone marrow. The ability of this nanoscale, biomimetic scaffold composed of PAs that are inscribed with cellular adhesive ligands to direct hMSC osteogenic differentiation without supplements, along with other cellular behaviors, was investigated. Typical osteogenic supplements include dexamethasone, β-glycerol phosphate, and ascorbic acid. The synthesized PA sequences were evaluated as two-dimensional nanomatrix coatings without the inorganic …

Performance Characterization And Reconfiguration Of Wireless Sensor Networks, Parag P. Joshi

All ETDs from UAB

Some attributes of a wireless sensor network (WSN) are its large scale of deployment, possible harsh ambient conditions, and limited resource budgets. Therefore, minimizing the demand placed on resource utilization is vital. WSN applications that require binary or quantized information are of interest owing to the resulting savings in bandwidth and power. Two very important applications of binary WSNs are target localization and target detection. Optimizing a multi-modal surface to estimate a target’s location and power is a highly complex problem. Deterministic and stochastic approaches are computationally intensive and sluggish or converge to local minima, causing large estimation errors. This …

Ergonomic Analysis Of A Hair Salon, Joseph Keebler, David Schuster, Scott Ososky

Publications

Cosmetology involves a number of diverse tasks that have been implicated in cumulative trauma disorders and in other workplace injuries. This case study presents an analysis of injury risk and prevalence in a salon. Individual, occupational, and organizational factors are considered, and potential areas where risk can be reduced are presented.

A Comparison Of Filtering Approaches For Aircraft Engine Health Estimation, Daniel J. Simon

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Different approaches for the estimation of the states of linear dynamic systems are commonly used, the most common being the Kalman filter. For nonlinear systems, variants of the Kalman filter are used. Some of these variants include the LKF (linearized Kalman filter), the EKF (extended Kalman filter), and the UKF (unscented Kalman filter). With the LKF and EKF, performance varies depending on how often Jacobians (partial derivative matrices) are updated. In other words, we see a tradeoff between computational effort and filtering performance. With the unscented Kalman filter, Jacobians are not calculated but computational effort is typically high due to …

Fabrication And Characterization Of Room Temperature Operating Single Electron Transistors Using Focused Ion Beam Technologies, Prasanjit Santosh Karre

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

The single electron transistor (SET) is a Coulomb blockade device, whose operation is based on the controlled manipulation of individual electrons. Single electron transistors show immense potential to be used in future ultra lowpower devices, high density memory and also in high precision electrometry. Most SET devices operate at cryogenic temperatures, because the charging energy is much smaller than the thermal oscillations. The room temperature operation of these devices is possible with sub- 10nm nano-islands due to the inverse dependance of charging energy on the radius of the conducting nano-island. The fabrication of sub-10nm features with existing lithographic techniques is …

Mse News 2008, Department Of Materials Science And Engineering, Michigan Technological University

Department of Materials Science and Engineering Annual Reports

Table of Contents

• MSE Department Welcomes New Assistant Professor
• Lee Retires
• Peter Moran
• Michigan Tech Honors Levy for Research Efforts in Magneto-Photonics
• Student Accomplishments
• Awards and Honors
• Alumni News

Electrical And Computer Engineering Research Report 2008, Department Of Electrical And Computer Engineering, Michigan Technological University

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering Annual Reports

• Department
• Research
• New Chair
• Publications
• Enterprise

The Power Of Soil: Using It To Our Advantage, Judith L. Sims, R. Otis

Biological Engineering Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Biomedical Circuits And Systems Dedicated For Sensing And Neurostimulation: Case Study On Urinary Bladder Dysfunctions, Mohamad Sawan, Aguibou Ba, Faycal Mounaim, Jacques Corcos, Mostafa Elhilali

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

This paper covers circuits and systems techniques for the construction of high reliability biosensing and neurostimulation smart medical devices. Such microsystems are dedicated for interconnections through the peripheral neural systems. Case study related to applications such as bladder control is discussed. Available electrical neurostimulation techniques for the rehabilitation of urinary bladder functions do not allow an adequate voiding due to dyssynergia between the bladder and the sphincter. A new implantable stimulator, built with commercially available electronic components, was designed to overcome these difficulties. The proposed system performs two types of stimulations: Selective Stimulation for bladder voiding and Permanent Stimulation to …

Determinants Of Financial Health Of Us General Aviation Airports, Vitaly S. Guzhva, Massoud Bazargan, David A. Byers

Management, Marketing and Operations - Daytona Beach

This survey-based study investigates the current financial environment of US general aviation airports. Due to a dearth of data and research on the financial performance of general aviation airports, the paper provides vital information regarding the critical needs and major revenue sources of such airports.The findings suggest that general aviation airports can be self-sustaining regardless of their location, runway length and other airport-specific characteristics.The attitudes of the airport manager towards the importance of financial self-sustainability, positive relationships with local communities, and utilisation of non-traditional and non-aviation revenue sources are found to be critical for the financial health of general aviation …

The Use Of Modeling Tools In The Analysis Of Functional Requirements, Gopi Kamadia

All ETDs from UAB

The thesis offers an Object-Oriented analysis methodology to investigate the functional requirements of software systems with modeling technologies, such as Unified Modeling Language (UML) and Systems Modeling Language (SysML). The main focus of the analysis is to discover objects and describe them in the problem domain. The thesis also proposes a validation process for the requirements stage of the development life cycle with an Acclaro Design For Six Sigma (DFSS) approach. A software development experiment is carried out with a case study of a threedimensional graphics game. The game is first implemented without following any sound analysis process and then …

Can Laser Speckle Flowmetry Be Made A Quantitative Tool?, Donald D. Duncan, Sean J. Kirkpatrick

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

The ultimate objective of laser speckle flowmetry (and a host of specific implementations such as laser speckle contrast analysis, LASCA or LSCA; laser speckle spatial contrast analysis, LSSCA; laser speckle temporal contrast analysis, LSTCA; etc.) is to infer flow velocity from the observed speckle contrast. Despite numerous demonstrations over the past 25 years of such a qualitative relationship, no convincing quantitative relationship has been proven. One reason is a persistent mathematical error that has been propagated by a host of workers; another is a misconception about the proper autocorrelation function for ordered flow. Still another hindrance has been uncertainty in …

Lipid Productivity Of Algae Grown On Dairy Wastewater As A Possible Feedstock For Biodiesel, Ian C. Woertz

Master's Theses

The objective of this thesis is to develop a biological wastewater treatment system that utilizes algal growth to simultaneously create renewable energy in the form of biodiesel and digester biogas, remove polluting nutrients, and abate greenhouse gases. Research under the Department of Energy Aquatic Species Program during 1978-1996 concluded that cultivating algae for biofuels was cost prohibitive at that time and that an integrated approach should be studied that combined wastewater treatment with algal biofuel production. Nutrient removal, in particular nitrogen and phosphorus, from wastewater is a growing regulatory need and the use of algae cultivation could create a unique …

Mesenchymal Stem Cell Interaction With Nanostructured Biomaterials For Orthopaedic Applications, William Charles Clem

All ETDs from UAB

Orthopaedic implants fail when bone loss around the anchoring region of the prosthesis causes the components to loosen. A revision surgery is needed to replace worn components, and bone grafting is often required to fill the void caused by osteolysis. A solution for the problem of osteolysis may be the improvement of wear resistance at the articulating surfaces by substituting materials with greater hardness. This dissertation describes two strategies for increasing the surface hardness of titanium alloy (Ti-6Al-4V) implants, without increasing surface roughness or compromising osseointegration. The first strategy utilizes microwave plasma to induce titanium nitride formation by nitrogen diffusion. …

The Convergence Envelope For Iterative Estimation In Ss-Parse, Ningzhi Li

All ETDs from UAB

A novel and recently developed fast magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technique, Single-Shot Parameter Assessment by Retrieval from Signal Encoding (SSPARSE), promises significant improvements in robustness and accuracy of local signal parameter estimates compared to the conventional MRI methods. In using a more accurate signal model, the reconstruction for SS-PARSE differs from the traditional Fourier transform method. An iterative estimation algorithm, progressive length conjugate gradient (PLCG), is currently employed by SS-PARSE to reconstruct independent parameter maps of local magnetization, transverse relaxation rate and frequency. In practice, the large number of degrees of freedom and partial poor conditioning of the problem itself …

Analysis Of Number And Mass Concentration Of Coarse And Fine, Nancy Garcia

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

There is currently much concern over particles suspended in the ambient air, their effects on people and the environment throughout the world. The suspended particles can cause adverse health effects, reduce visibility and over the course of time wear buildings. Primary air quality concerns are of particles, their effects and their key characteristics. Particle number concentration (NC) of traffic emissions is an important element of the study, specifically heavy duty diesel engine emissions. Particle number concentration is the number of particles of a specific size in a unit of air; in this study they are measured by the number of …

Screening The Phytoremediation Potential Of Native Plants Growing On Mine Tailings In Arizona, Usa, Md Nazmul Haque

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Mining companies have been playing an important role for the utilization of the Earth's natural resources for the prosperity of human society. However, the mining of resources has generated solid wastes called tailings that have become a serious environmental threat worldwide. Technologies such as soil caping have been used to remediate the problem. Nevertheless, the remediation of mine tailings using conventional technologies is costly and environmentally unpleasant. Since the last few decades, a plant based technology known as phytoremediation has appeared as a promising alternative. Several plant species have demonstrated to have phytoremediation capabilities; though, best results have been obtained …

Allocating Emergency Response Vehicles To Cover Critical Infrastructures, Hao Lei

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Optimal deployment of limited emergency response service units in a metropolitan area is of interests to public agencies. The limited emergency units not only have to respond to the demand for service by residents and businesses, but also cover Critical Infrastructures (CIs). This Thesis formulates an improved optimization model to allocate different types of Emergency Response Service (ERS) units among their candidate base stations. The allocation of units must ensure maximum coverage to CIs, subject to the capacities of the base stations, service standard in terms of time to reach the CIs, and the availability of the ERS units (when …

Assessment Of Human Muscle Fatigue From Surface Emg Signals Recorded During Isometric Voluntary Contractions By Using A Cosine Modulated Filter Bank, Cristhian Mauricio Potes

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Human muscle fatigue involves both a decrease in the frequency and increase in the amplitude of a surface electromyographic (EMG) signal. Muscle fatigue is also related to a decrease of the force impeding to reach the same initial level of the maximum voluntary contraction (MVC). To determine muscle fatigue indices, a method is proposed by decomposing a surface EMG signal into 32-subbands. This decomposition was attained by using a cosine modulated filter bank. The

surface EMG signals analyzed during this research were recorded during isometric voluntary contractions. Both the instantaneous mean frequency (IMF) and the instantaneous amplitude (IA) are estimated …

Optimal In-Situ Bioremediation System Design Using Simulated Annealing, H. J. Shieh, Richard C. Peralta

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

The presented procedure combines continuous simulated annealing (CSA) heuristic optimization with BIOPLUME II simulation for optimizing in-situ bioremediation system design. The design goal is to minimize the total cost of facility installation and operation needed to achieve contaminant plume containment and cleanup. System design elements include pumping rates and well locations. During optimization, pumping rates are treated as continuous variables, differing from previously reported simulated annealing combinatorial optimization for groundwater management. To improve computation efficiency, CSA annealing schedules employing four different temperature update functions (TUF) are contrasted. Each yields somewhat different optimal designs and requires different computation effort. An adaptive …

Identification Of Factors In Road Accidents Through In-Depth Accident Analysis, Mouyid B. Islam, Kunnawee Kanitpong

CUTR Faculty Journal Publications

The rising trend of motorization and improving socio-economic status of Thai people directly influences the aggravating road safety situation with fatalities and permanently disabled injuries of about 130,000 and 500,000 respectively over the past decades. An estimated annual cost from road crashes amounts to about US$2,500 million, 3.4 percent of Gross National Product (GNP), undoubtedly inflicts Thailand with a burning public health concern in the South East Asian region. This paper addresses an in-depth study through crash investigation and reconstruction which has not yet been practised in Thailand to identify the contributory factors in road crashes by the concerned authorities. …

Data Mining Techniques In Fraud Detection, Rekha Bhowmik

Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law

The paper presents application of data mining techniques to fraud analysis. We present some classification and prediction data mining techniques which we consider important to handle fraud detection. There exist a number of data mining algorithms and we present statistics-based algorithm, decision treebased algorithm and rule-based algorithm. We present Bayesian classification model to detect fraud in automobile insurance. Naïve Bayesian visualization is selected to analyze and interpret the classifier predictions. We illustrate how ROC curves can be deployed for model assessment in order to provide a more intuitive analysis of the models.

The 2007 Analysis Of Information Remaining On Disks Offered For Sale On The Second Hand Market, Andy Jones, Craig Valli, Glenn S. Dardick, Iain Sutherland

Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law

All organisations, whether in the public or private sector, increasingly use computers and other devices that contain computer hard disks for the storage and processing of information relating to their business, their employees or their customers. Individual home users also increasingly use computers and other devices containing computer hard disks for the storage and processing of information relating to their private, personal affairs. It continues to be clear that the majority of organisations and individual home users still remain ignorant or misinformed of the volume and type of information that is stored on the hard disks that these devices contain …

Treatment Of Aqueous Waste Streams At Eli Lilly - Alternatives To Incineration, Barry Hennessy

Theses

The aim of this project was to investigate the potential to treat liquid waste (secondary) from production processes at Eli Lilly with the emphasis on minimising the volume of waste sent for thermal oxidation. In addition, the project aimed to investigate if the chosen technology was diverse and potentially capable of handling waste streams from different processes. Membrane technology was identified as one of the most suitable technologies and trials were carried out on secondary waste from three production processes. The literature review and practical thrials aswell as assessment of trial results ran from October 2003 to June 2005.

All …

Development And Characterization Of A Mechanically Prestressed Piezoelectric Composite, Byron Fitzgerald Smith

Theses and Dissertations

Piezoelectric composites have been investigated for use in a variety of areas, including flow control, structural control, energy harvesting, and fuel ignition systems. While many of the investigations conducted in these areas have utilized traditional piezo actuation systems, such as unimorphs or stack actuators, a growing number of research groups are examining the increased performance derived from the mechanical advantage, and enhanced domain rotation, found in prestressed unimorph designs. Prestressed devices, like Thunder® and LIPCA, have been shown well suited for a number of applications; however, the price associated with these devices can often prevent them from being implemented. In …

A Process Plan For Consensus Building In The Evaluation Of Nsgc & Epscor Native American Outreach Program, Jocelyn S. Nickerson, Brent D. Bowen, Henry R. Lehrer

Publications

The NASA Nebraska Space Grant (NSGC) & EPSCoR Programs at the University of Nebraska at Omaha have embarked on a unique educational journey known as the Nebraska Native American Outreach program (NNAOP). The NNAOP’s main objective is to encourage and motivate Native American students to be more competitive in mathematics and science. This program has allowed for a variety of educational and public outreach activities to take place. However, in order to continually provide effective support to Nebraska’s Native American community, NSGC & EPSCoR sought an evaluation technique for the NNAOP. To execute such an evaluation, NSGC organized the first …

Flexible Service Provisioning For Heterogeneous Sensor Networks, Chien-Liang Fok, Gruia-Catalin Roman, Chenyang Lu

All Computer Science and Engineering Research

This paper presents Servilla, a highly flexible service provisioning framework for heterogeneous wireless sensor networks. Its service-oriented programming model and middleware enable developers to construct platform-independent applications over a dynamic set of devices with diverse computational resources and sensors. A salient feature of Servilla is its support for dynamic discovery and binding to local and remote services, which enables flexible and energy-efficient in-network collaboration among heterogeneous devices. Furthermore, Servilla provides a modular middleware architecture that can be easily tailored for devices with a wide range of resources, allowing even resource-limited devices to provide services and leverage resource-rich devices for in-network …

Analytical Solution To The Wave Equation With Discrete Pressure Sources: A Model For The Rijke Tube, Eduardo G. Perez

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Despite of having been studied for several decades the phenomena of combustion instabilities are not well understood. Pressure waves due to the combustion instabilities can become violent being detrimental for both the performance and combustor life. A good prediction of the pressure distribution inside the combustor is important in order to prevent theoccurrence of this phenomenon. In this work a technique for solving the wave equation with discrete sources (or sinks) using the Green's functions was developed. One and two-dimensional approaches for cylindrical and Cartesian coordinates withconstant speed of sound were solved. Also the case of one-dimensional axially varying temperature …

Thermal Degradation And Aging Of High Temperature Piezoelectric Ceramics, Sunil W. Gotmare

University of Kentucky Master's Theses

Piezoelectric materials have numerous applications like high temperature accelerometers, pressure, flow and NDT transducers, acoustic emission, ultrasonic cleaning, welding, high voltage generators, medical therapy etc. The commonly used piezoelectric material, PZT continues to dominate the commercial market for piezoelectric actuators applications. The primary limitations of PZT are the lower Curie temperature T_C <390^oC and rapid thermal degradation avobe 200^oC.

Continuing efforts are focused on the development of piezoelectric materials suitable for high temperature applications >200^oC. These materials will be very useful for making sensors for space exploration, oil and geothermal well drilling tools, oil …