Digital Commons Network^™

Evaluation Of Two Novel Aluminum-Free, Zinc-Based Glass Polyalkenoate Cements As Alternatives To Pmma Bone Cement For Use In Vertebroplasty And Balloon Kyphoplasty, Gladius Lewis, Mark R. Towler, Daniel Boyd, Matthew J. German, Anthony W. Wren, Owen M. Clarkin, Andrew Yates

Chemical and Biochemical Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Vertebroplasty (VP) and balloon kyphoplasty (BKP) are now widely used for treating patients in whom the pain due to vertebral compression fractures is severe and has proved to be refractory to conservative treatment. These procedures involve percutaneous delivery of a bolus of an injectable bone cement either directly to the fractured vertebral body, VB (VP) or to a void created in it by an inflatable bone tamp (BKP). Thus, the cement is a vital component of both procedures. In the vast majority of VPs and BKPs, a poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) bone cement is used. This material has many shortcomings, notably …

Study Of Stability Of Time-Domain Features For Electromyographic Pattern Recognition, Dennis Tkach, He Huang, Todd A. Kuiken

Electrical, Computer, and Biomedical Engineering Faculty Publications

Background: Significant progress has been made towards the clinical application of human-machine interfaces (HMIs) based on electromyographic (EMG) pattern recognition for various rehabilitation purposes. Making this technology practical and available to patients with motor deficits requires overcoming real-world challenges, such as physical and physiological changes, that result in variations in EMG signals and systems that are unreliable for long-term use. In this study, we aimed to address these challenges by (1) investigating the stability of time-domain EMG features during changes in the EMG signals and (2) identifying the feature sets that would provide the most robust EMG pattern recognition.

Methods: …

Electroporation-Mediated Delivery Of A Naked Dna Plasmid Expressing Vegf To The Porcine Heart Enhances Protein Expression, W. G. Marshall Jr., B. A. Boone, J. D. Burgos, S. I. Gografe, M. K. Baldwin, M. L. Danielson, M. J. Larson, D. R. Caretto, Y. Cruz, B. Ferraro, L. C. Heller, K. E. Ugen, M. J. Jaroszeski, R. Heller

Bioelectrics Publications

Gene therapy is an attractive method for the treatment of cardiovascular disease. However, using current strategies, induction of gene expression at therapeutic levels is often inefficient. In this study, we show a novel electroporation (EP) method to enhance the delivery of a plasmid expressing an angiogenic growth factor (vascular endothelial growth factor, VEGF), which is a molecule previously documented to stimulate revascularization in coronary artery disease. DNA expression plasmids were delivered in vivo to the porcine heart with or without coadministered EP to determine the potential effect of electrically mediated delivery. The results showed that plasmid delivery through EP significantly …

Kentucky Water Resources Research Institute Annual Technical Report Fy 2009, Kentucky Water Resources Research Institute, University Of Kentucky

KWRRI Annual Technical Reports (USGS’s 104b Grant Program)

The 2009 Annual Technical Report for Kentucky consolidates reporting requirements of the Section 104(b) base grant award into a single document that includes: 1) a synopsis of each research project conducted with grant funds during the period, 2) citations for related publications, reports, and presentations, 3) a description of information transfer activities, 4) a summary of student support during the reporting period, and 5) notable awards and achievements during the year.

Tapping Environmental History To Recreate America’S Colonial Hydrology, Christopher L. Pastore, Mark B. Green, Daniel J. Bain, Andrea Muñoz-Hernandez, Charles J. Vörösmarty, Jennifer Arrigo, Sara Brandt, Jonathan M. Duncan, Francesca Greco, Hyojin Kim, Sanjiv Kumar, Michael Lally, Anthony J. Parolari, Brian Pellerin, Nira Salant, Adam Schlosser, Kate Zalzal

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

To properly remediate, improve, or predict how hydrological systems behave, it is vital to establish their histories. However, modern-style records, assembled from instrumental data and remote sensing platforms, hardly exist back more than a few decades. As centuries of data is preferable given multidecadal fluxes of both meteorology/climatology and demographics, building such a history requires resources traditionally considered only useful in the social sciences and humanities. In this Feature, Pastore et al. discuss how they have undertaken the synthesis of historical records and modern techniques to understand the hydrology of the Northeastern U.S. from Colonial times to modern day. Such …

The Journal Of Undergraduate Research: Volume 08

The Journal of Undergraduate Research

This is the complete issue of the South Dakota State University Journal of Undergraduate Research, Volume 8.

Tartaric Acid Modified Rice Hull As A Sorbent For Methylene Blue Removal, Siew Teng Ong, Pei Sin Keng, Ai Wen Chong, Siew Ling Lee, Yung Tse Hung

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

Problem statement: Improper dye discharge from various industries such as textile, paper, cosmetic and plastics into receiving streams can be one of the sources towards water pollution. The release of these effluents not only causes various disruptions in the ecosystems, but also poses hazard effect as most of the dyes are highly toxic, mutagenic and carcinogenic in nature. Approach: To prepare an inexpensive and efficient sorbent by chemically modifying rice hull for the removal of Methylene Blue (MB) which is predominantly used in coloring acrylic fiber. Batch experiments were carried out for the removal of MB from aqueous solution by …

The Human-Centric Warehouse, Kevin R. Gue

11th IMHRC Proceedings (Milwaukee, Wisconsin. USA – 2010)

In theory and in practice, the objective of warehouse design has long been to meet operational requirements of throughput and service performance at minimum cost. A natural product of this “bottom line” approach has been warehouse buildings and operations ill-suited to the humans who spend their working lives interacting with them. We offer an explanation for the current approach, and argue that a new approach— a new paradigm —is needed. We then describe a comprehensive approach to warehouse design that includes human well-being as a primary goal.

Isolation And Characterization Of Bacteria From Extended Aeration Wastewater Treatment Plants., Randy Chin Kok Fei

Student Works (2010-2019)

In this study, three different wastewater treatment plants (STP1, STP2 and STP3) were sampled in Klang Valley. STP1 exhibited the best activated sludge health with healthy Sludge Volume (SV), Mixed Liquor Suspended Solids (MLSS) and Mixed Liquor Volatile Suspended Solids (MLVSS). STP2 were constantly disrupted by the mechanical failures which caused its dissolved oxygen (DO) to decrease whereas STP3 was troubled by the inadequate alkalinity in its mixed liquor causing acidic condition in aeration tank. The acidic condition resulted in pin-floc problem and contributed to high Total Suspended Solids (TSS) and low SV. Influent at STP3 was also found to …

A Comparison Of Hemodynamic Performance In Mehcanical And Biological Heart Valve Prostheses, Philip Mathew

Masters Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Heart valve prostheses are used to replace heart valves in patients afflicted with valvular heart disease. The malfunctioning heart valve adversely affects the fluid mechanical performance. While the choice of mechanical VS biological valve prostheses is dependent on the patient, the biological valves should have improved hemodynamic performance compared to the mechanical valves. This work focused on CFD analysis of the Starr-Edwards caged ball valve and a biological valve and serves to validate the improved hemodynamics of the latter valve in comparison to the former. Commercial CFD software (CFD-GEOM, CFD-ACE, CFD-VIEW) are used for the analys is. The main results …

Applying Geographic Information Systems To Support Strategic Environmental Assessment: Opportunities And Limitations In The Context Of Irish Land-Use Plans, Ainhoa Gonzalez, Alan Gilmer, Ronan Foley, John Sweeney, John Fry

Articles

The strengthening of spatial database infrastructures, further promoted by the INSPIRE Directive adopted in 2007, has led to an increased use of spatial data in planning and decision-making. Given that land-use plans are intrinsically spatial, such evidence and approaches can significantly benefit plan-making. A spatial framework could especially support the specific Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) aspects of the plan-making process. Spatial tools such as Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are particularly well-placed to support the environmental integration sought in SEA by providing evidence through the spatial assessment of multiple environmental datasets. Moreover, GIS bring the opportunity to augment conventional assessment techniques …

Speech Intelligibility From Image Processing, Andrew Hines, Naomi Harte

Articles

Hearing loss research has traditionally been based on perceptual criteria, speech intelligibility and threshold levels. The development of computational models of the auditory-periphery has allowed experimentation via simulation to provide quantitative, repeatable results at a more granular level than would be practical with clinical research on human subjects.

Low-Cost Obstacle Detection Sensor Array For Unmanned Agricultural Vehicles, Santosh Pitla, Joe D. Luck, Scott A. Shearer

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Presentations and White Papers

Mobile robots deployed for agricultural applications must operate in harsh environments where they encounter a variety of both moveable and immovable obstacles. Typically, robots utilize vision sensors to learn about the environment in which they are working. In this study, a low-cost infra-red (IR) sensor array was developed to act as an obstacle detection aid for an unmanned agricultural vehicle (UAgV). The IR sensor array developed consists of six IR sensors mounted on two orthogonal steel plates. The array of sensors was continuously oscillated about the yaw-axis to traverse a 200° field of view in front of the UAgV. Three …

Far-Field Optical Nanoscopy Based On Continuous Wave Laser Stimulated Emission Depletion, C. Kuang, Wei Zhao, Guiren Wang

Faculty Publications

Stimulated emission depletion (STED) microscopy is one of the breakthrough technologies that belong to far-field optical microscopy and can achieve nanoscale spatial resolution. We demonstrate a far-field optical nanoscopy based on continuous wave lasers with different wavelengths, i.e., violet and green lasers for excitation and STED, respectively. Fluorescent dyes Coumarin 102 and Atto 390 are used for validating the depletion efficiency. Fluorescent nanoparticles are selected for characterizing the spatial resolution of the STED system. Linear scanning of the laser beams of the STED system along one line of a microscope slide, which is coated with the nanoparticles, indicates that a …

Application Of Magnetic Resonance Imaging To Understanding The Pathogenesis Of The X-Linked Leukodystrophy Pelizaeus-Merzbacher Disease, Jeremy Jerome Laukka

Wayne State University Dissertations

Myelin is a multilamellar membrane structure surrounding axons in both the CNS and PNS that facilitates nerve conduction. In the CNS, myelin is synthesized by oligodendrocytes, while in the PNS, myelin is synthesized by Schwann cells. In the CNS, Proteolipid protein 1 (PLP1), an integral membrane protein, is the major protein component of myelin, constituting ~50% of myelin protein. Mutations of the PLP1 gene in man cause a spectrum of neurological disease, ranging from the severe Pelizaeus-Merzbacher disease (PMD), that typically begins during infancy with nystagmus, seizures and hypotonia and evolves into spastic quadriparesis, cognitive impairment and ataxia, to ¡¥pure¡¦ …

Asynchronous Particle Swarm Optimization-Based Search With A Multi-Robot System: Simulation And Implementation On A Real Robotic System, Sali̇h Burak Akat, Veysel Gazi̇, Lino Marques

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

In this article we consider a version of the Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithm which is appropriate for search tasks of multi-agent systems consisting of small robots with limited sensing capability. The proposed method adopts asynchronous mechanism for information exchange and position (way point) updates of the agents. Moreover, at each (information exchange) step the agents communicate with only a possibly different subset of the other agents leading to a dynamic neighborhood topology. We implement the algorithm using the Player/Stage realistic robot simulator as well as on real KheperaIII robots using experimentally collected realistic data of ethanol gas concentration. Simulation …

Program And Proceedings: Nebraska Academy Of Sciences 1880–2010, 130th Anniversary Year, One Hundred-Twentieth Annual Meeting

Nebraska Academy of Sciences: Programs and Proceedings

Program

Aeronautics and Space Science

Chemistry and Physics

Collegiate Academy: Biology

Collegiate Academy: Chemistry and Physics

Biological and Medical Sciences

Chemistry and Physics

History and Philosophy of Science

Nebraska Wesleyan University Health and Sciences Graduate School Fair

Junior Academy, Senior High Competition/p>

Aeronautics and Space Science, Poster Session

Teaching of Science and Math

Maiben Memorial Lecture: Mark Greip, Department of Chemistry, University of Nebraska–Lincoln

Aeronautics

Anthropology

Junior Academy, Senior High Competition

Earth Science

Junior Academy, Junior High Competition

Electron Beam Lithography Throughput And Resolution Enhancement With Innovative Blanker Design, Junru Ruan

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Electron Beam Lithography (EBL) is one of the most important and most widely used methods for nano-fabrication. The primary advantage of electron beam lithography is its high resolution, and its ability to expose nanometer features without a mask. On the other hand, one of the key limitations of electron beam lithography is throughput. Slow blanking speed is one of the major bottlenecks for the system speed. In this dissertation, I will first review the prior literature of high speed blanking. Thorough theoretical and experimental studies are done on the existing designs. Physical models are built and analytical ray tracing is …

Nanivid : A New Research Tool For Tissue Microenvironment Studies, Waseem Khan Raja

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

Metastatic tumors are heterogeneous in nature and composed of subpopulations of cells having various metastatic potentials. The time progression of a tumor creates a unique microenvironment to improve the invasion capabilities and survivability of cancer cells in different microenvironments. In the early stages of intravasation, cancer cells establish communication with other cell types through a paracrine loop and covers long distances by sensing growth factor gradients through extracellular matrices. Cellular migration both in vitro and in vivo is a complex process and to understand their motility in depth, sophisticated techniques are required to document and record events in real time. …

Design And Performance Analysis Of Genetic Algorithms For Topology Control Problems, Cem Safak Sahin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

In this dissertation, we present a bio-inspired decentralized topology control mechanism, called force-based genetic algorithm (FGA), where a genetic algorithm (GA) is run by each autonomous mobile node to achieve a uniform spread of mobile nodes and to provide a fully connected network over an unknown area. We present a formal analysis of FGA in terms of convergence speed, uniformity at area coverage, and Lyapunov stability theorem.

This dissertation emphasizes the use of mobile nodes to achieve a uniform distribution over an unknown terrain without a priori information and a central control unit. In contrast, each mobile node running our …

Determination Of Autoregressive Model Orders For Seizure Detection, Serap Aydin

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

In the present study, a step-wise least square estimation algorithm (SLSA), implemented in a Matlab package called as ARfit, has been newly applied to clinical data for estimation of the accurate Auto-Regressive (AR) model orders of both normal and ictal EEG series where the power spectral density (PSD) estimations are provided by the Burg Method. The ARfit module is found to be usefull in comparison to a large variety of traditional methods such as Forward Prediction Error (FPE), Akaike's Information Criteria (AIC), Minimum Description Lenght (MDL), and Criterion of Autoregressive Transfer function (CAT) for EEG discrimination. According to tests, the …

Stator Resistance Estimation Using Ann In Dtc Im Drives, Mustafa Aktaş, H. İbrahi̇m Okumuş

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

Torque control of induction motors (IM) requires accurate estimation of the flux in the motor. But the flux estimate, when estimated from the stator circuit variables, is highly dependent on the stator resistance of the IM. As a result, the flux estimate is prone to errors due to variation in the stator resistance, especially at low stator frequencies. In this paper, an Artificial Neural Network (ANN) is used to adjust the stator resistance of an IM. A back propagation training algorithm was used in training the neural network for the simulation. The proposed ANN resistance estimator has shown good performance …

Artificial Neural Network Based Chaotic Generator For Cryptology, İlker Dalkiran, Kenan Danişman

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

Chaotic systems are sensitive to initial conditions, system parameters and topological transitivity and these properties are also remarkable for cryptanalysts. Noise like behavior of chaotic systems is the main reason of using these systems in cryptology. However some properties of chaotic systems such as synchronization, fewness of parameters etc. cause serious problems for cryptology. In this paper, to overcome disadvantages of chaotic systems, the dynamics of Chua's circuit namely x, y and z were modeled using Artificial Neural Network (ANN). ANNs have some distinctive capabilities like learning from experiences, generalizing from a few data and nonlinear relationship between inputs and …

Nonlinear Dynamic Analysis Of Mitral Valve Doppler Signals: Surrogate Data Analysis, Esma Uzunhi̇sarcikli

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

In our study, the nonlinear dynamics of mitral valve Doppler signals from 32 healthy and 28 patients with mitral valve stenosis was evaluated using by the computation of Lyapunov exponents, correlation dimension values and surrogate data analysis. Two chaotic features are compared for healthy and patient subjects. It was found that the largest Lyapunov exponent and correlation dimension values derived from patient subjects were larger than that of healthy subjects (\rho < 0.005). Surrogate data analysis was performed to determine the chaotic dynamics of Doppler signals. It was observed that the original and surrogate data have similar spectral features. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were used to evaluate the nonlinearity character Area Under the curve (AUC) values were obtained as 0.99 and 0.978 for the largest Lyapunov exponent and correlation dimension values, respectively. According to these results, Doppler signals have a nonlinear dynamic property and the largest Lyapunov exponent. Correlation dimension features can be used to detect the change in blood flow velocity of patients with mitral valve stenosis.

Washout Filter Based Control For The Hodgkin-Huxley Nerve Cell Dynamics, Reşat Özgür Doruk

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

In this work we present a washout filter based control approach for stabilizing the oscillations in Hodgkin-Huxley type neurons. The oscillations occur due to the bifurcations that arise from the potassium and sodium channel conductance deviations. The MATCONT toolbox software environment was used for analysis of the bifurcation points in conjunction with MATLAB. The simulations of the Hodgkin-Huxley (HH) model at those points are provided to validate the results obtained from the MATCONT software. Then a washout filter is proposed to stabilize the oscillations occur at the Hopf bifurcation points where the external current injection is used to provide the …

A Novel Method For Lung Segmentation On Chest Ct Images: Complex-Valued Artificial Neural Network With Complex Wavelet Transform, Murat Ceylan, Yüksel Özbay, Osman Nuri̇ Uçan, Erkan Yildirim

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

Image segmentation is an important step in many computer vision algorithms. The objective of segmentation is to obtained an optimal region of convergences (ROC). Error in this stage will impact all higher level activities. This paper focuses on a new efficient method denoted as Complex-Valued Artificial Neural Network with Complex Wavelet Transform (CWT-CVANN) for the segmentation of lung region on chest CT images. In this combined architecture is composed of two cascade stages: feature extraction with various levels of complex wavelet transform and segmentation with complex-valued artificial neural network. Here, 32 CT images of 6 female and 26 male patients …

Sdre Optimal Control Of Drug Administration In Cancer Treatment, Mehmet İti̇k, Meti̇n Uymaz Salamci̇, Stephen Paul Banks

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

In this study, we apply State Dependent Riccati Equation (SDRE) based optimal control technique to a nonlinear tumor growth model. The model consists of three biological cells which are normal tissue, tumor and immune cells. The effect of chemotherapy treatment is also included in the model. Chemotherapy administration is considered as a control input to the nonlinear cancer dynamics and the amount of administered drug is determined by using SDRE optimal control. The optimal control is applied to the model in order not only to drive the tumor cells to the healthy equilibrium state but also to minimize the amount …

Using Covariates For Improving The Minimum Redundancy Maximum Relevance Feature Selection Method, Olcay Kurşun, Cemal Okan Şakar, Oleg Favorov, Ni̇zametti̇n Aydin, Sadik Fi̇kret Gürgen

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

Maximizing the joint dependency with a minimum size of variables is generally the main task of feature selection. For obtaining a minimal subset, while trying to maximize the joint dependency with the target variable, the redundancy among selected variables must be reduced to a minimum. In this paper, we propose a method based on recently popular minimum Redundancy-Maximum Relevance} (mRMR) criterion. The experimental results show that instead of feeding the features themselves into mRMR, feeding the covariates improves the feature selection capability and provides more expressive variable subsets.

Performance Analysis Of Swarm Optimization Approaches For The Generalized Assignment Problem In Multi-Target Tracking Applications, Ali̇ Önder Bozdoğan, Asim Egemen Yilmaz, Murat Efe

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

The aim of this study is to investigate the suitability of selected swarm optimization algorithms to the generalized assignment problem as encountered in multi-target tracking applications. For this purpose, we have tested variants of particle swarm optimization and ant colony optimization algorithms to solve the 2D generalized assignment problem with simulated dense and sparse measurement/track matrices and compared their performance to that of the auction algorithm. We observed that, although with some modification swarm optimization algorithms provide improvement in terms of speed, they still fall behind the auction algorithm in finding the optimum solution to the problem. Among the investigated …

2010 Nebraska Water Monitoring Programs Report, Marty Link

Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality: Reports

The Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality (NDEQ) is charged with monitoring, assessing, and to the extent possible, managing the state’s water resources. The purpose of this work is to protect and maintain good quality water and encourage or execute activities to improve poor water quality. Monitoring is done on the over 18,000 miles of flowing rivers and streams, our greater than 280,000 acres of surface water in lakes and reservoirs, and the vast storage of groundwater in Nebraska’s aquifers.