Digital Commons Network^™

Semi-Automated Wine Case Palletizer, Ashley A. Corona, Joshan Darji, Russell Williams, Brett Beaudoin

Mechanical Engineering

The Semi-Automated Wine Case Palletizer project was sponsored by Saucelito Canyon Winery to reduce the physical demands of manually palletizing wine cases during bottling operations.

Using customer requirements developed through sponsor meetings and observations, the team designed, manufactured, and tested a semi-automated palletizing system consisting of a rotating carousel platform, pneumatic scissor-lift assembly, airbag jack, and forklift-compatible base. The design allows operators to maintain an ergonomic working height while accessing all pallet locations from a single position.

Engineering analyses, including finite element, fatigue, and buckling analyses, verified the structural integrity of the design. Prototype testing confirmed successful operation of the …

Me3328 Combined Loading Beam Bending Lab, Alejandro Islas, Viswesh Vancheeswaran, Owen Spencer, Henry Andrews

Mechanical Engineering

Serving as a new laboratory experiment for ME 3328 (Design for Strength & Stiffness), strain gauges were adhered, wired, and calibrated on a cantilever beam lab apparatus capable of undergoing pure bending, pure torsion, and combined bending.

Design And Evaluation Of An Open-Source Ac/Dc Power Converter For Microgrid Applications, Ryan J. Rayos

Master's Theses

This thesis presents the design, implementation, and evaluation of an open-source bidirectional power conversion platform intended for microgrid applications. As distributed energy resources, battery storage systems, and hybrid AC/DC architectures continue to increase in adoption, there is a growing demand for flexible, low-cost, and programmable power electronic platforms capable of interfacing between DC and AC subsystems. Existing commercial solutions are often proprietary and expensive, limiting their accessibility for educational, research, and rapid prototyping applications. This work expands upon the existing open-source Atinverter platform by increasing its operating voltage capability, integrating bidirectional power flow, and implementing telemetry systems suitable for microgrid …

Ai Interview Helper: A Tool For Assisting Search And Rescue Long-Profile Interviews, Dylan P. Starink

Master's Theses

In Search and Rescue (SAR) operations, time pressure and limited interviewer experience can lead to missed opportunities when interviewing a missing person’s friends and family. This thesis presents a real-time, end-to-end system that provides context-aware follow-up question suggestions as interviews unfold. Leveraging large language models (LLMs) and agentic design patterns, the system is intended to support interviewers by helping them identify relevant follow-up questions and pursue potentially overlooked lines of inquiry.

The system was evaluated through three mock interviews with two SAR interviewer participants across two events. Given the limited sample size, the results provide early insights into the feasibility …

Equitable Decompositions: A Gateway To Spectral Theory Through Graph Automorphisms, Daniel Ford

Master's Theses

Graphs with symmetry appear throughout mathematics and its applications, from the structure of molecules and network design to combinatorial game theory. A central question in spectral graph theory is how to compute or characterise the eigenvalues of the matrices associated with such graphs. Classical decomposition methods, such as diagonalisation or Jordan normal form, accomplish this but only once some spectral information is already known. A different approach, introduced by Barrett et al. (2015), uses the automorphisms of a graph to block-diagonalise its adjacency matrix without any prior spectral information. Because one of the resulting summands is always the quotient matrix …

Effects Of Atmospheric Drag On Angles-Only Initial Relative Orbit Determination Accuracy In Low Earth Orbit, Sydney Walsh

Master's Theses

Growing congestion in low Earth orbit is increasing the demand for effective space situational awareness, straining ground station capabilities. Space-based relative orbit determination offers an alternative, using line-of-sight angle measurements from a chaser spacecraft to estimate a target spacecraft's orbit. This research focuses on angles-only initial relative orbit determination (IROD), where no prior target state knowledge is assumed. It investigates how IROD solution accuracy is affected by differential atmospheric drag between the chaser and target spacecraft. A nonlinear batch least squares filter is designed to estimate the target's initial state, which is compared against a truth solution. It was found …

Determining K Clusters In K-Means Clustering With The Crab Algorithm, Jasmine Kristine S. Cabrera

Master's Theses

Unsupervised clustering often faces the challenge of determining the correct number of clusters in the absence of a true target variable. Traditional methods such as the Elbow Method and the Silhouette Score can produce ambiguous results and rely on assumptions about cluster shape or separation. To address this, we created the Clustering Rivals and Buddies (CRAB) algorithm which evaluates clusters based on stability across multiple subsamples. CRAB uses pairwise classifications to identify points that consistently group together called “Buddies” and points that remain separated called “Rivals.” Applied with K-means, CRAB accurately recovers underlying cluster structures in both spherical and non-spherical …

Teaching Multi-Core Architecture: Design And Implementation Of A Cache-Coherent Cpu For Undergraduate Education, Isaac R. Lake

Master's Theses

Modern computing has relied on multicore processors for high performance for nearly two decades, yet undergraduate computer engineering curricula often provide limited exposure to parallel hardware architectures and their design challenges. This thesis presents the design of CPE 433, a course that extends the pipelined and cached OTTER CPU developed in CPE 233 and CPE 333 into a multicore processor capable of running parallel workloads. The thesis documents the architectural changes required to adapt the verified single-core design into a multicore system, including MMIO-based interrupt support, a shared cache hierarchy with cache-coherence mechanisms, and clock-gated modules. It further presents a …

Thermally Induced Color Changes In Iron Oxide Containing Coatings, Tabatha Whitfield

Master's Theses

Wildland-urban interface (WUI) fires and residential conflagrations present significant challenges for post-fire damage and fire propagation analysis. CAL FIRE observed reddening in architectural coatings during the 2025 Pacific Palisades fire with no determination of the cause. While heat-induced color change of infrastructure coatings has been studied, its potential use as a thermal exposure indicator in residential fire events remains largely unexplored. The objective of this study was to characterize the heat-induced color change of yellow iron oxide containing coatings subjected to thermal exposures, replicating residential fire conditions. The coatings were applied to commonly used building materials and exposed to direct …

Implementation Of A Line-Scan Camera Triangulation Sensor For A Ball Balancer, Jackson R. Mclaughlin

Master's Theses

Ball Balancer or Ball on Plate systems are used for education and research in control theory. These consist of a plate which can be actively tilted, with a ball rolling on the surface. Students are challenged to model the dynamics of the system and implement a control loop which is capable of stabilizing the ball by actuating the plate.  The mechatronics group at Cal Poly is developing hardware for one of these ball-balancer systems, for future use in the Mechanical Engineering curriculum.

The position of the ball relative to the plate must be measured in order to control and stabilize …

Practice-Oriented Seismic Design And Retrofit For Mid-Story Isolated Buildings, Luke Reilly

Master's Theses

This study reviews the state of the art of MSI and evaluates a practical framework for preliminary design using coupling coefficients. A database of 155 research documents is compiled and classified into analytical, mixed numerical, computational, experimental, and miscellaneous studies. The review identifies major research trends, common modeling approaches, important design parameters, and remaining limitations. In addition, 16 representative MSI building projects are reviewed. These applications show that MSI is most often used for retrofit, vertical expansion, mixed-use buildings, over-track construction, and buildings with major functional or structural discontinuities. The study then examines the Coupling Coefficients (CCs) Method as a …

A History Of The Underground Comix Scene: The Seriousness Of An Unserious Genre, Harris Darcie Shugart

Master's Theses

The Underground Comix Scene of the 1960s and 1970s was born out of an age of censorship. The Comics Code Authority, a regulatory body created by the Comics Magazine Association of America in 1954, established guidelines requiring publishing houses to self-regulate following a recommendation from the United States Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Delinquency in 1953. Comix with an X, for their X-rated nature, represent an emerging counter-culture in the latter half of the 1960s and the 1970s, with an epicenter of San Francisco. These comix and their artists were not interested in obtaining the looming ‘Seal of Approval’ from the …

Boundary Influence In Truncated Groundwater Models: Reconstructing A Local-Scale Modflow Model From A Consultant-Developed Regional Model In The Monterey Subbasin, Bruce K. Liscomb

Master's Theses

Regional groundwater models built by consultants contain valuable calibrated frameworks but are often too large and complex for repeated local-scale analysis. Rather than rebuilding an entirely new smaller model, this study truncates the existing consultant-built regional model of the Monterey Subbasin, preserving the original grid structure and parameter framework while reducing the active domain to a manageable size for planning-level use. A key finding is that boundary-condition representation exerted a dominant influence on simulated groundwater behavior within the truncated domain, highlighting that truncation is a structural decision that meaningfully affects how the model responds. Model performance was evaluated two ways. …

The Effects Of Carbon-Fiber Plates And Peba-Based Midsole Foam In Running Shoes On Lower-Limb Joint Kinetics And Kinematics In Recreational Female Runners, Jordan M. Allen

Master's Theses

The recent increase in long-distance running participation and the rapid advancement in footwear technology have created a need for research on injury prevention in this growing population of recreational runners. When “super shoes” were first introduced to the running scene, they caught the attention of runners worldwide with the rapid improvement in marathon performance [1]. Today, every major running brand offers its own version of a super shoe, each incorporating a carbon-fiber plate and PEBA-based midsole foam. While previous studies have shown the performance benefits of these shoes, a gap remains in the literature regarding how they impact knee, hip, …

The Implementation Of Scintillation Detectors With The Cuore/Cupid Collaboration In The Search For Neutrinoless Double Beta Decay, Reese Sandra Cormier

Physics

CUORE (Cryogenic Underground Observatory for Rare Events) is an experiment at the Gran Sasso National Laboratory in Assergi, Italy, currently searching for an answer to the matter-antimatter asymmetry problem; the question: why do we exist? One proposed explanation is neutrinoless double beta decay, a theorized exotic decay that would prove that neutrinos are their own antiparticle, violating the current Standard Model for particle physics. However, current detection methods do not distinguish different types of particle interactions, resulting in alpha decays contributing to the background. Therefore, the experimental sensitivity is too limited to make confident determinations about the data. For this …

Simulation Of Powder Spreading For Metal Additive Manufacturing, Florence Duff

Master's Theses

The powder recoating process for Laser Powder Bed Fusion requires iterative experimentation to develop the correct process parameters that will result in high quality parts. There currently lacks good spread quality metrics and models for optimizing spread quality. A machine that simulates the powder spreading process was built to streamline the process of selecting process parameters for specific types of powders without having to operate the full laser system. The parameters investigated were the layer thickness and spreading speed. The response variables were metrics developed to assess spread quality: the percentage of the build plate covered by powder and the …

Evaluating Design Choices For Gpu-Accelerated Finite-Difference Time-Domain Simulation On Resource-Constrained Devices, Joel Manesh

Master's Theses

The Finite-Difference Time-Domain (FDTD) method is a numerical technique for solving partial differential equations. It was first developed to solve Maxwell’s equations for electromagnetic wave propagation and has since been extended to model other physical phenomena governed by wave propagation. Because the FDTD method is data-parallel, it is well-suited for GPU acceleration; modern FDTD-based simulations run offline on large GPU clusters. There is, however, very little research on running FDTD on resource-constrained embedded GPUs, which are increasingly popular for real-time applications.

This thesis explores a CUDA-based FDTD solver for the 3D wave equation on the Nvidia Jetson Orin Nano. This …

Greenhouse Scan-To-Bim, Mattheus Hsu-Ning Johnson

Architectural Engineering

This senior project focuses on the implementation of Scan-to-BIM software for capturing and modeling an existing building within Experimental Construction laboratory. The design of the project was to model the building using a 3D scan with the support of world measurements to document and create a digital model of the building. By doing this the project can evaluate the effectiveness, efficiency, and accuracy of integrating 3D scanning technologies into BIM modeling.

The project included taking data from a recent scan of the Experimental Construction Laboratory. We then took these scans and imported them to Autodesk Revit to develop a detailed …

Lidar At Poly Canyon, An Binh Chuong

Architectural Engineering

Poly Canyon serves as a living laboratory that reflects Cal Poly’s “Learn by Doing” philosophy through a collection of student-designed and student-constructed structures. Among these is Fratessa Tower, a reinforced concrete observation tower distinguished by its tripod support system, cable-suspended observation deck, and steel spiral staircase. The tower’s unconventional geometry and exposed structural system present unique challenges for documentation, making it well suited for evaluating modern reality-capture and modeling techniques.

This project focused on creating an accurate as-built Building Information Model (BIM) of Fratessa Tower using LiDAR-based scanning, field verification, and Autodesk Revit. Point cloud data were processed to reconstruct …

Building With Mass Timber. A Comparative Analysis Of Mass Timber Production In The United States And Europe, Polina Slaboff

Architectural Engineering

The construction and building industries are some of the largest contributors to global carbon emissions accounting almost 42% of global emissions according to Architecture 2030 (2026), prompting increased interest in sustainable building materials such as mass timber. This paper investigates mass timber production in the United States and Europe through a comparative analysis of supply chain, vertical integration, manufacturing processes, machinery, and policy differences. Despite the United States’ abundant forest resources and a growing market demand, American mass timber production continues to lag behind Europe due to limited mill operation, limited vertical integration and demand in commodity lumber, production processes, …

Stem Workshops For Pre-K Students, Sofia Berg, Ashlyn Swoboda

Architectural Engineering

This project involved the development and implementation of a four-part structural engineering workshop series for preschool-aged children at the Orfalea Children’s Center at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. The workshops were designed to introduce fundamental structural engineering concepts through age-appropriate discussions, demonstrations, and hands-on activities focused on engineering careers, structural shapes, skyscrapers, and bridges. The lessons emphasized concepts such as stability, bracing, structural loading, seismic behavior, and iterative design while encouraging collaboration, creativity, and problem solving.

Throughout the workshop series, students actively participated in discussions, demonstrated enthusiasm for engineering activities, and were able to recall concepts introduced in …

Xenaforms: Reinforcing Kinematic Stability Through Rigid Connections, Katherine G. Thies

Architectural Engineering

XenaForms combine rigid planes and straight lines with the fluidity of structural origami to create beautiful, organic folded plate structures. Unlike many conventional structures, folded plate systems derive their stability from the interaction between connected panels, creating the appearance of a single continuous sheet of material. The XenaForm uses structural origami and triangulation to create stable points at the apex of two non-colinear triangles. While it is mathematically true that no moment needs to be transferred across the seam between panels in order to have a stable structure, allowing some moment capacity greatly helps during construction. Specifically, these stiff connections …

Thousand Hills Pet Resort Deck Design, Kenzie Brown

Architectural Engineering

On-site residential units at Thousand Hills Pet Resort currently lack ADA-compliant access, as entry is limited to small, elevated doorways that are only reachable by stairs. A deck connecting the units and providing accessible ingress and egress was designed for this senior project.

In addition to the ADA requirements, the property is expected to undergo significant redevelopment in the coming years. As a result, the deck design must not only meet accessibility needs but also be adaptable and reusable. The final design is a modular deck structure utilizing a hybrid foundation system that facilitates future relocation of the deck. The …

Modular House Design Study, Jordan J. P. Smith

Architectural Engineering

The Modular House is a student designed and constructed structure in Poly Canyon. For decades it served as a home for the Canyon’s caretakers who maintained the structures, looked over the Canyon, and helped construct student projects. After being abandoned for a variety of reasons, the structure now currently stands as an open-air pavilion.

This project studies The Modular House as a unique and storied site and proposes a theoretical retrofit to make the structure habitable again. Historical documents, past senior projects, images, and firsthand accounts were reviewed to understand the site’s history and how it changed over time. In …

Design And Implementation Of A Honeycomb Damping System For The 2026 Eeri Seismic Design Competition, Vera Nguyen, Lauryn Wojcik

Architectural Engineering

The authors of this report were a part of the 2026 Earthquake Engineering Research Institute (EERI) chapter at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. In July 2026, they will travel to Portland, Oregon with 12 students to compete in the Undergraduate Seismic Design Competition hosted by EERI. The competition required teams to develop a comprehensive structural design proposal that included computer-based modeling and analysis, construction of three physical models, and the preparation of both a technical poster and oral presentation for a proposed high-rise building located in Portland, Oregon. Cal Poly’s “Illahee Tower” was designed with an emphasis on …

Sotto L'Ulivo, Makayley Washburn, Alex Twomey, Juliana Pantoja, Megan Boyle, Mark Tain Lawson

Architectural Engineering

Over the span of six years, four Architectural Engineering senior project teams designed and developed a shade structure adjacent to Engineering West (Building 21) at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. Each phase of the project built upon the last, showcasing student work and application of the ARCE curriculum with the help and guidance of Professor Craig Baltimore.

In the fall of 2025, five Architectural Engineering seniors chose to continue this project and complete the construction of the structure and plaza. The Sotto L’Ulivo phase picked up where the last team left off, taking on the construction of the …

The Xenaform: Structure Through Geometry, Justin Tobias Mendoza Ocampo, Emily Marie Labrador, Banyan Walker, Paul Minchev, Brayden Sean Kelleher, Ethan Mario Ceccarelli

Architectural Engineering

The XenaForm is a geometry-driven structural system that incorporates complex forms generated from simple rules of stability, inspired by the work of Iannis Xenakis and reworked by Professor Edmond Saliklis. This project investigates how structural stability can be achieved through geometric configurations rather than a reliance upon material strength alone. By utilizing the design principles of trilateration and the interconnection of triangular panels, the XenaForm was constructed in accordance with the rules of the International Association for Shell and Spatial Structures Pavilion Competition. The team generated several design iterations and selected a final design to fabricate and construct, considering affordability, …

Skip The Grid: Bringing Power To The Navajo And Hopi Nation, Benjamin R. Narciso

Construction Management

Skip the Grid is an interdisciplinary service-learning project that provides sustainable energy solutions to families with school-aged children living in the Navajo and Hopi Nations. In March 2026, a team of 23 students from five academic disciplines at California Polytechnic State University (Cal Poly) partnered with Heart of America, SOLV Energy, and NextPower to complete the program's fifth year. The project's purpose was to improve the quality of life and support educational success by providing reliable access to electricity, lighting, and refrigeration in underserved communities. Participants were organized into five installation teams consisting of Cal Poly students, faculty, industry partners, …

Fatal, Trista Smith

Intertidal

No abstract provided.

Completing The Street: Rapid Redesign Of Citywide Road Networks Using Arcgis, Davidson Drake

City and Regional Planning

This paper was written by Davidson Drake, a student at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, and a volunteer with the City of Pomona Planning Department. The mapping, design, and analysis documented in this paper were produced by the author for the City of Pomona as part of its Complete Streets work. While the work shown here is the author’s own, the broader project would not be possible without the efforts of Karla Foster and Max Pastore, who contributed key components to the project.

Pomona’s Complete Streets project represents an ambitious effort to rethink the city’s street network as …