Digital Commons Network^™

Model For Movement Classification Of The Bicep, Youssef Kharrat , '23

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

This project introduces a classification model whose purpose is the distinction between the two possible movements done by the bicep; namely flexion and rotation. Surface EMG data was collected using the MIKROE-2621. It was later sampled from Analog to Digital by a Nucleo 401-RE board at 200 Hz. To generate the dataset, I connected the apparatus to my arm and performed the movements a total number of 300 times. This data was later analyzed and a choice of features were made that eventually was fed into MATLAB Classification Learner. A Support Vector Machine performed best and was able to classify …

Agen/Bsen 112 Final Project: Moving And Temperament Of Cattle, Elly Vo, Taetum Baxa, Ved Patel, Brady Giles, Tami M. Brown-Brandl, Rossana Villa-Rojas

Department of Agricultural and Biological Systems Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Cattle movement and weather may affect the body temperature of cows which in turn affects their natural behavior and can influence their metabolism. Cattle take several days to resume their normal eating patterns after being overheated, and that can affect dairy production. This project was assigned to study the effect of temperament (calm vs excitable) and evaporative cooling on the body temperature of moving animals to optimize the environmental conditions around the cattle and consequently, dairy production.

The project began with processing of a data set from Tami Brown-Brandl who was the client/adviser for the group. The data contained the …

Transfer Learning, Model Interpretation, And Dataset Bias Analysis For Automated Violence Detection From Video, Erik Clemens

Master's Theses (2009 -)

Many communities have installed surveillance cameras in an effort to deter and respond to violence.Due to the difficulty of constantly monitoring such camera feeds, these systems are rarely used to provide real-time information. To enable rapid alerts and information for first responders, this thesis develops a proof-of-concept system capable of automatically detecting violence from video footage. This system is developed by fine-tuning a convolutional neural network that has previously demonstrated success on general action recognition tasks. This thesis explores two new techniques to improve the accuracy of the fine-tuned model. The first is a data augmentation technique that generates aspect …

Soot Formation And Ignition Characteristics Of Gasoline/Ethanol Fuel Blends Using A Rapid Compression Machine, Joseph Richard Keller Gross

Master's Theses (2009 -)

With the growing societal concern toward vehicle emissions, renewableforms of fuel are garnering increased interest in the fuel research world. While electrification is prevalent amongst the light duty sector, many challenges arise for such type of powerplant in heavy duty vehicles. Further, current heavy duty mixing-controlled combustion uses diesel fuel, which produces significant black carbon emissions in the exhaust. Alcohol fuels from biological sources serve as a promising source ofrenewable energy for heavy duty engines. The soot emissions and thermodynamic properties of ethanol/gasoline blended fuels must be understood and quantified in order to develop heavy duty combustion engine technology capable …

Design, Realization, And Verification Of A Planar, Tendon-Driven, Variable Stiffness Finger, Allison Goetz

Master's Theses (2009 -)

Traditional robotic manipulators are designed for accurate absolute positioning and require a highly structured environment to perform simple operations. They are unable to compensate for small discrepancies in the relative positioning of the robot end-effector with respect to its environment. A task-appropriate compliance allows a robotic manipulator to compensate for small discrepancies in the position or orientation of an object when the object is constrained. A better means of realizing task-appropriate structured compliant behavior is needed to allow a robot to perform dexterous manipulation.In this thesis, three agonist-antagonist variable stiffness actuators (VSAs) are used to independently control the joint stiffnesses …

Effect Of Storage Condition On Penetration Threshold Of Porcine Skin Tissue, Jared Michael Koser

Master's Theses (2009 -)

Buried blast explosions create small projectiles which can become lodged in the tissue of personnel as far away as hundreds of meters. Without appropriate treatment, these lodged projectiles can become a source of infection and prolonged injury to soldiers in modern combat. Human cadavers can be used as surrogates for living humans for ballistic penetration testing, but human cadavers are frozen during transport and storage. The process of freezing and thawing the tissue before testing may change the biomechanical properties of the tissue. The goal of the current study was to investigate the effect of tissue storage on penetration threshold …

Computational Fluid Dynamics Model Of Hyperthermic Intraperitoneal Chemotherapy., Olivia Cooney

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Hyperthermic intraperitoneal chemotherapy (HIPEC) is a procedure that targets abdominal tumors in the intraperitoneal space. During the procedure, chemotherapy heated to 40-43^oC is cycled through the abdomen for 1 to 2 hours. Although a majority of studies have focused on clinical outcomes, the dynamics of the intra-abdominal flow remain poorly understood. Consequently, it has been difficult to gauge the tumor targeting efficacy, which depends critically on temperature and chemotherapy flow rates. This study establishes a computational framework to evaluate the dynamics of fluid flow during HIPEC, with the goal to enable optimization of tumor drug exposure. A computer …

Metabolomic Differentiation Of Tumor Core And Edge In Glioma., Mary E. Baxter

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Glioma is one of the most aggressive forms of brain cancer. It has been shown that the microenvironments differ significantly between the core and edge regions of glioma tumors. This study obtained metabolomic profiles of glioma core and edge regions using paired glioma core and edge tissue samples from 27 human patients. Data was acquired by performing liquid-liquid metabolite extraction and 2DLC-MS/MS on the tissue samples. In addition, a boosted generalized linear machine learning model was employed to predict the metabolomic profiles associated with O-6-methylguanine-DNA methyltransferase (MGMT) promoter methylation.

A panel of 66 metabolites was found to be statistically significant …

Potential Of Flow Energy Reduction By Coral Reef: Hydrodynamic Analysis On Acropora Species, Faisal Karim

Theses

One of the most crucial components of the ocean ecology is coral reefs. Being environmentally sustainable, natural structures like coral reefs have recently drawn a lot of attention as a means of reducing the flow energy. The absence of scientific validations on the potential of coral reefs in reducing high-energy flow limits engineering applications of coral reefs to the benefit of civilization. In this research, extensive experimental studies were carried out to investigate the capabilities of coral reefs, to reduce high-energy flows. To determine the high-energy wave reduction by coral reefs, the coral roughness coefficient along with the coral structure …

Targeting Lncrna Ddit4-As1 Sensitizes Triple Negative Breast Cancer To Chemotherapy Via Suppressing Of Autophagy, Ting Jiang, Jiaojiao Zhu, Shilong Jiang, Zonglin Chen, Ping Xu, Rong Gong, Changxin Zhong, Yueying Cheng, Xinyuan Sun, Wenjun Yi, Jinming Yang, Wenhu Zhou, Yan Cheng

Markey Cancer Center Faculty Publications

In this study, it is found that the lncRNA, DNA damage inducible transcript 4 antisense RNA1 (DDIT4-AS1), is highly expressed in triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) cell lines and tissues due to H3K27 acetylation in the promoter region, and promotes the proliferation, migration, and invasion of TNBC cells via activating autophagy. Mechanistically, it is shown that DDIT4-AS1 induces autophagy by stabilizing DDIT4 mRNA via recruiting the RNA binding protein AUF1 and promoting the interaction between DDIT4 mRNA and AUF1, thereby inhibiting mTOR signaling pathway. Furthermore, silencing of DDIT4-AS1 enhances the sensitivity of TNBC cells to chemotherapeutic agents such as paclitaxel both …

Integrated Experimental And Dft Study Of Palladium And Nickel Metals Supported On Reducible Metallic Oxides For Selective Hydrogenation Of Alkynes And Dienes Bonds, Toyin Daniel Shittu

Dissertations

This dissertation investigates the capacity of ceria (CeO₂) to serve as a stand-alone reactive catalyst, and to act as catalyst support for different catalyst configurations. Experimental and density functional theory (DFT) approach were used to critically predict and to design ceria-containing catalysts. Ceria owes the catalytic propensity to the ability to undergo switch in the oxidation state from the +4 to +3 states. Motivated by experimental studies involving CeO₂ catalysts, defects CeO₂ surface with an oxygen vacancy (CeO2(111)_Vo) was used to explore the decomposition chemistry of methanethiol based on DFT. The potential formation pathways revealed that …

Approximate Computing Based Processing Of Mea Signals On Fpga, Mohammad Emad Hassan

Dissertations

The Microelectrode Array (MEA) is a collection of parallel electrodes that may measure the extracellular potential of nearby neurons. It is a crucial tool in neuroscience for researching the structure, operation, and behavior of neural networks. Using sophisticated signal processing techniques and architectural templates, the task of processing and evaluating the data streams obtained from MEAs is a computationally demanding one that needs time and parallel processing.
/="/">
/="/">This thesis proposes enhancing the capability of MEA signal processing systems by using approximate computing-based algorithms. These algorithms can be implemented in systems that process parallel MEA channels using the Field …

Flexible Materials And Applications For Wearable Sensors, Brock Ferrari

Senior Honors Theses

This literature review aimed to address the limitations of rigid wearable sensors in the medical community by investigating the development of flexible materials for remote health monitoring. A keyword search was conducted on Google Scholar, PubMed, and the Jerry Falwell Library, which yielded 9,102 articles. After applying filtering techniques, the results were narrowed down to 21 articles, which were categorized into "Present Market Conditions," "Flexible Materials for Medical Use," "Applications for Wearable Sensors," and "Potential Use Cases." Discussions were held on prominent materials such as substrate, nanocomposite, and liquid metal materials, exploring their potential applications for chemical and physical sensing, …

Application Of Image Processing In Soil Mechanics, Luke Knodel

Senior Honors Theses

Whenever someone digs a hole in the ground or takes a relaxing walk on the beach, they directly interact with the soil. In its basic form, soil consists of solid, water, and air phases. Unlike water and metals, soil is a particulate media, and the relative proportion of the individual phases significantly influences its physical properties. Various studies have analyzed soil using image processing to determine its morphological properties. Research involving the digital processing of X-ray Computed Tomography (X-ray CT) images of soil to retrieve physically meaningful information is gaining recognition. This study investigates two-dimensional X-ray CT images of unsaturated …

On Hydrophobic Deep Eutectic Solvents: Thermo-Physical Properties And Applications In Gas Solubility, Shan Khai Liew

Masters Theses

Carbon dioxide (CO2) has been widely recognized as one of the greenhouse gases (GHGs) in the atmosphere. GHGs cause global warming, which will bring a lot of problems and irreversible changes. To curb CO2 emissions, much effort has been done. There are many technologies available for CO2 capture, such as amine scrubbing, pressure or temperature swing adsorption, membrane separation, and many solvents and absorbents that have been proposed for CO2 capture (e.g., zeolite, silica materials, graphene, activated carbon, etc.) at every stage (pre-combustion, post-combustion, oxy-combustion). However, these materials have their own drawbacks. Hydrophobic deep eutectic solvents (HDES) is a green …

Capabilities Of Conductive Thread Twisted-And-Coiled Actuators As Sarcomeres, Bryan T. Le , '23

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

Twisted-and-coiled actuators (TCAs) have shown great potential as an artificial muscle for robotics in terms of material cost and production expenses. However, the power-to-force efficiency of these artificial muscles falls short of biological muscles. Soft robotics takes inspiration from biological organisms for more natural movement, and biological mimicry helps increase the efficiency of robotics. Taking inspiration from how sarcomeres are structured in natural muscles, improvements in the energy efficiency of artificial muscles are possible. In this paper, an experiment was designed to analyze the effects on the efficiency of emulating biological sarcomere structures in artificial muscles. Specifically, this experiment used …

Entre Punzones Y Percutores Reconstrucción De Tecnología Ósea De Los Selk'nam (Tierra Del Fuego), Rachel Dietz

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Esta investigación se enfoca en el estudio, reconstrucción y uso de la tecnología ósea empleada por las sociedades cazadoras-recolectoras-pedestres que ocuparon el litoral Atlántico de Tierra del Fuego, durante el Holoceno, específicamente se enfoca en la tecnología utilizada por los Selk´nam del Norte de Tierra del Fuego. La tecnología ósea fue una parte importante de su cultura y dos tipos fueron elegidos para investigar: percutores blandos y punzones huecos. Los percutores blandos fueron confeccionados sobre huesos de guanaco, un recurso importante para las sociedades cazadoras-recolectoras.

Los percutores blandos fueron usados para la formatización de artefactos líticos a través de la …

An Autonomous Aerial Drone System For Water Fluorescence Mapping And Targeted Sampling, Kazi Ragib Ishraq Sanim

Theses and Dissertations

At present, aerial drones, also known as Uncrewed Aircraft Systems (UAS) or Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV), are increasingly used in time and effort-heavy scientific exploration applications. One such application is inspecting the physical, chemical, and biological state of water bodies. This thesis presents a novel autonomous system capable of sensing water properties and collecting up to three 250 mL water samples from multiple sampling locations. The system features a customized aerial drone with an in-house built fluorescence sensor and pumping mechanism. It can also map the gradient of fluorescent content across the body of water to determine the best sampling …

A Device For Measuring Acoustic Output Intensity Of Transcranial Doppler Ultrasound Transducers For Comparison With Fda Regulations, Sarah Altman, Gregory Bashford, Benjamin Hage

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

Transcranial Doppler Ultrasonography (TCD) is a non-invasive methodology which can evaluate cerebral blood flow velocity in real time. Single-element focused circular transducers placed on the scalp produce ultrasound waves capable of penetrating the skull with minimal aberration, enabling measurement of the Doppler shift. As such, TCD can measure blood flow velocity in the internal carotid and vertebral arteries, as well as the arteries of the Circle of Willis: the Anterior Cerebral (ACA), Posterior Cerebral (PCA), and Middle Cerebral Arteries (MCA). Intracranial aneurysm and ischemic stroke are serious conditions in which ballooning or occlusion of cerebral vessels cause insufficient perfusion, leading …

Real-Time Facial Expression Recognition Using Edge Ai Accelerators, Mark Heath Smith

Theses and Dissertations

Facial expression recognition is a popular and challenging area of research in machine learning applications. Facial expressions are critical to human communication and allow us to convey complex thoughts and emotions beyond spoken language. The complexity of facial expressions creates a difficult problem for computer vision systems, especially edge computing systems. Current Deep Learning (DL) methods rely on large-scale Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) which require millions of floating point operations (FLOPS) to accomplish similar image classification tasks. However, on edge and IoT devices, large-scale convolutional models can cause problems due to memory and power limitations. The intent of this work …

Neurodevelopmental And Transient Impacts Of Brain Kynurenic Acid Elevation And Sleep-Wake Behavior, Katherine Rentschler

Theses and Dissertations

Sleep is vital for healthy cognition and mood. Sleep dysregulation is implicated in psychiatric disorders such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. Sex differences in sleep and arousal dysregulation are prominent in patients with psychotic disorders. Elevated levels of the neuroactive tryptophan metabolite, kynurenic acid (KYNA), have been found in cerebrospinal fluid and postmortem brain tissue samples from patients with psychotic disorders. KYNA is an astrocyte derived antagonist at N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) glutamate receptors and α7 nicotinic acetylcholine (α7nACh) receptors. KYNA is synthesized in the brain from its biological precursor, kynurenine, via the enzyme kynurenine aminotransferase II (KAT II), a potential therapeutic …

Utilizing Deep Learning Methods In The Identification And Synthesis Of Gene Regulations, Jiandong Wang

Theses and Dissertations

Gene expression is the fundamental differentiation and development process of life. Although all cells in an organism have essentially the same DNA, cell types and activities vary due to changes in gene expression. Gene expression can be influenced by many gene regulations. RNA editing contributes to the variety of RNA and proteins by allowing single nucleotide substitution. Reverse transcription can alter the expression status of genes by inducing genetic diversity and polymorphism via novel insertions, deletions, and recombination events. Gene regulation is critical to normal development because it enables cells to respond rapidly to environmental changes. However, identifying gene regulations …

Speckle Development And Application In Uav-Based Digital Image Correlation For Transportation Infrastructure Monitoring And Assessment, Taylor Wyatt

Theses and Dissertations

A critical aspect of civil infrastructure is structural health monitoring, of which digital image correlation (DIC) has been proven to be an effective and appropriate method. There is sufficient literature on the use of stationary DIC, but an unexplored aspect is DIC-equipped unmanned aircraft systems. It has been verified in University of South Carolina labs but has not been proved in a field environment. One of the challenges of field implementation is large scale speckle application. This work focusses on identifying and addressing challenges in bringing UAV-DIC technology from the lab to the field. This includes the development of optimized …

The Photochemical Evolution Of Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons And Nontronite Clay On Early Earth And Mars, Nina Kopacz, Maria Angela Corazzi, Giovanni Poggiali, Ayla Von Essen, Vincent Kofman, Teresa Fornaro, Hugo Van Ingen, Eloi Camprubi, Helen E. King, John Brucato, Inge Loes Ten Kate

School of Integrative Biological & Chemical Sciences (Formerly Dept. of Biology)

The photochemical evolution of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), an abundant form of meteoritic organic carbon, is of great interest to early Earth and Mars origin-of-life studies and current organic molecule detection efforts on Mars. Fe-rich clay environments were abundant on early Earth and Mars, and may have played a role in prebiotic chemistry, catalyzing the breakdown of PAHs and freeing up carbon for subsequent chemical complexification. Current Mars is abundant in clay-rich environments, which are most promising for harboring organic molecules and have comprised the main studied features by the Curiosity rover in search of them. In this work …

Evaluating The Impact Of Land Use Changes, Drivers Of Tmdl Development, And Green Infrastructure On Stream Impairments, Charitha Jayasri Gunawardana

Dissertations (1934 -)

Despite the water quality improvements and regulatory advancements over the last 50 years since the enactment of the Clean Water Act, water bodies within the United States are still impaired for a broad range of contaminants from non-point source pollution. Improving watershed management approaches to meet this challenge will require a greater understanding of (1) how changes within a watershed, such as changing land use, impact stream water quality, (2) what influence socioeconomic, spatial and political factors may have on the progress towards meeting water quality goals, such as those set within Total Maximum Daily Loads (TMDLs), and (3) how …

Method Design For Separation Of Non-Canonical Dna Structures Via Capillary Electrophoresis, Erin V. Chen , '23

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

G-quadruplex DNA structures are highly relevant subjects of biochemical study, implicated in human diseases and cancer. Conventional methods for G-quadruplex DNA structure separation are time-consuming, environmentally unfriendly, and low throughput. Thus, there is a pressing need for alternative methods of separation to be developed for G-quadruplex DNAs. Here we present work in designing a separation method using the capillary electrophoresis instrument. Capillary electrophoresis is a highly automated, reusable, and quantitative technique that separates analytes based on their size and charge. A capillary method for G-quadruplex separation would be a valuable analytical tool to supplement the biophysical methods available by addressing …

The Potential For Mycofiltration Of E. Coli Pollution In The Crum Creek Using T. Versicolor And P. Ostreatus, Kennedy M. Hill , '23

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

Mycoremediation is a cost-effective and environmentally friendly alternative to conventional wastewater and drinking water treatment, as well as other environmental remediation methods. This project will design a mycofiltration system using mushroom species T. versicolor and P. ostreatus. Water from a section of the Crum Creek, located in Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, U.S.A, will be sampled and filtered through this system to remove Escherichia coli (E. coli). The mycofiltered water will be compared to the Environmental Protection Agency standards for E. coli concentrations in recreational and drinking water to measure how effective T. versicolor or P. ostreatus may be at removing …

Swimming Robots Using Memory Metal, Joshua R. Heckman , '23

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

While in the very early stages of life, Barnacle nauplii are only a few micrometers in length, which causes them to experience a very low Reynolds number while swimming through water. It is important to understand how these biological creatures swim, so their movements can be mimicked and incorporated into robotics. Currently, there are no autonomous underwater vehicles (AUV) that are capable of carrying out missions in fluids with low Reynolds numbers. This project aimed to replicate the movement of a Barnacle Napuli with the use of muscle memory wire, in hopes that one day a AUV that can operate …

Solar Sonification: From Data To Music With Solar Protocol, Chris O. Stone , '23

Senior Theses, Projects, and Awards

“Solar Sonification” is an interactive python notebook written in Jupyter Labs was designed to utilize data from a solar-powered web server to create and share data sonifications. It is an extension of the global network of solar-powered web servers known as Solar Protocol, one of which was built in 2020-2021 through the Halpern Family Foundation Engineering Design fund. Using this notebook, the participant is able to learn more about the functionalities of the server while engaging in their musical relationships being able to customize the pitches, instruments, and other musical parameters of the output as MIDI files. Files can be …

Systems Thinking As A Method For Leveraging Smart Classrooms, Jazmyne V. Del Hierro

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Digital technologies have revolutionized enterprises across our personal lives, and most major industries. The digital transformation can be considered a strategic response to digital trends (Vial, 2019), encompassing substantial changes in society and industry caused by technology development (Taj, et al., 2010). It is a complex journey that needs to be guided by clear strategy. Digital transformation is more about people, than it is about technology (Frankiewiczz, B., 2020). It requires organizational changes that are backed by leadership and driven by challenges to culture (Abbu, H., 2022). Digital transformation requires leaders to build trust (Mugge, Abbu, and Gudergan 2021; Gudergan …