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Vibration Analysis Of Piezoelectric Microcantilever Sensors, Amin Salehi-Khojin

All Dissertations

The main objective of this dissertation is to comprehensively analyze vibration characteristics of microcantilever-based sensors with application to ultra small mass detection and low dimensional materials characterization. The first part of this work focuses on theoretical developments and experimental verification of piezoelectric microcantilevers, commercially named Active Probes, which are extensively used in most today's advanced Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) systems. Due to special geometry and configuration of Active Probes, especially multiple jump discontinuities in their cross-section, a general and comprehensive framework is introduced for forced vibration and modal analysis of discontinuous flexible beams. More specifically, a general formulation is obtained …

To Re-Present A Stream: Stream Morphology And Environmental Art Combine Through Elementary Education, Jessica Lynn Thayer

All Theses

The interdisciplinary nature oflandscape architecture rarely occurs in our education system due to the divide b,etween the sciences and the humanities. This discipline divide is evident in the structure of school subjects from elementary school to college. By accepting the divided system, students are unknowingly affected by it and miss an opportunity for a truly interdisciplinary approach to education. As an alternative, this paper. proposes a combination of a science and a discipline of the humanities which can provide an inclusive education for students at any age. If students are taught in elementary school, not only to investigate surroundings through …

Assessing The Impact Of Water Harvesting On Water Resources, Jennifer Oblinger

All Theses

Clean water supplies, like all natural resources, are becoming scarce all over the world, but especially in developing countries where special interest groups (such as city governments, commercial farmers, other villages downstream, etc.) fight over water rights. The Foundation for Ecological Security (FES) is a non-government organization in India whose mission is to restore degraded lands through cooperation with rural villages. In order to increase the water supply to the ecosystem, FES constructs water harvesting structures (WHS) which impound rainfall, water that would have otherwise runoff and contributed to erosion, in surface storage. This study was conducted to assess the …

What Happens Monday?: The Impact Group Initiatives Have On Self-Appraised Problem-Solving Ability, Jessie Belter

All Theses

Effective problem solving is an essential skill for people to possess. Effective problem-solvers have fewer troubles when dealing with their problems and adjust to society better. Effective problem-solvers take the needed steps to solving their problems (Bloom and Broder, 1950; Heppner et al., 1982). Few studies have been conducted looking at the long-term effect of programs that have problem-solving as an anticipated outcome. The few that have (Gass & Priest, 2006; Hatch & McCarthy, 2005) have not been conclusive in their results. The current study looks at the impact of group initiative involvement on problem solving using the Problem Solving …

Resetting A Degrading Single Server Queue, Frank Volny Iv

All Theses

Real life servers do not have IID service times - they slow down over time. This is usually dealt with by resetting or replacing the server. Often, however, it is not known how to determine when the best time to reset the server is. Resetting may be a costly process. We make an assumption that only some arrivals (we do not know which) are harmful. Then, we proceed to find an optimal policy for resetting a server with a given service parameterization by observing the service paremeter directly, service times, or waiting times (with and without arrival times) when the …

Perfluorocyclobutyl Aryl Ether Polymers For Proton Exchange Membranes, Raul Hernandez

All Theses

Over the last decades Nafion¨ has emerged as the polymer of choice for the fabrication of Proton Exchange Membranes (PEM)s, due to its excellent proton conductivity and long-term stability. However, high temperatures and low relative humidity decrease fuel cell efficiency, due to the highly hydrated conditions required for proton conductivity. To overcome these issues, different types of sulfonated polymers have been proposed as promising substitutes for Nafion ¨, these include; Poly(arylene ether sulfones) (PAES) and Perfluorocyclobutyl (PFCB) aryl ether polymers among others.
Chapter 2 of this thesis describes the synthesis of a new class of sulfonated PAESs containing the perfluorocyclobutyl …

Ordered Matrices Of Prescribed Row And Column Sum, Janine Janoski

All Theses

Let M(n,s) be the number of nxn matrices with binary entries, row and column sum s, and whose rows are in lexicographical order. Let S(n) be the number of nxn matrices with entries from {0,1,2}, symmetric, with trace 0, and row sum 2. (The sequence S(n) appears as A002137 in N.J.A. Sloane's Online Encyclopedia of Integer Sequences.)
We give two proofs to show that M(n,2)=S(n). First, we show they satisfy the same recurrence. Second, we give an explicit bijection between the two sets. We also show that the bijection maintains the cycle structure of our matrices.
Let M_s(n,2) be the …

Economic Variables And Their Influence On Scientific Accplishment, Willis Boykin

All Theses

ABSTRACT This research looks for an association between economic variables and scientific advancement. More specifically, the main economic variables will be average schooling in the labor force, output per worker, capital per worker and different forms of the three. Index scores will provide a quantitative measure of scientific advancement. This paper explores the relationship of these variables among individuals and societies.

Analysis And Experiments For Tendril-Type Robots, Lara Cowan

All Theses

New models for the Tendril continuous backbone robot, and other similarly constructed robots, are introduced and expanded upon in this thesis. The ability of the application of geometric models to result in more precise control of the Tendril manipulator is evaluated on a Tendril prototype. We examine key issues underlying the design and operation of 'soft' robots featuring continuous body ('continuum') elements. Inspiration from nature is used to develop new methods of operation for continuum robots. These new methods of operation are tested in experiments to evaluate their effectiveness and potential.

Virtual Aesthetics And Ethical Communication: Towards Virtuous Reality Design, David Williams

All Theses

This thesis argues that ethics can and should be applied to Second Life avatar design and behavior. Second Life is a unique virtual reality due to its connection to the physical world primarily through financial devices. Users buy and sell virtual and physical goods over these networks; the avatar, it is argued, is the primary instrument for persuasion in these contexts. Avatars facilitate a virtual aesthetic that is primarily 'natural.' By creating aesthetic avatars, the developers of Second Life enable audiences to affectively associate with other 'residents.' Not only is the avatar designed for aesthetic appeal, but it enables users …

Of Merlins And King 'Authors': A Freireian Analysis Of The First-Year Writing Narrative, Ashley Lusk

All Theses

This thesis uses a Freireian analysis to unravel underlying ideologies in the university's first-year writing curriculum. By examining the characterizations and plots of the writing classroom narrative, we discover where issues of conflicting purpose and structure arise within frameworks of ideological constraint. This thesis considers the student-hero, the antagonistic qualities of the general education and state-mandated standardized curricula, and the role of the teacher who lies between these two entities. The Learning Community (LC) model provides a dialogic revision to current classroom practices in the student/teacher dynamic. The LC model accepts Freire's socially and ethically responsive conscientiza‹o as a way …

An Adaptive Algorithm For Prioritization In 802.11e Wirelss Networks, Will Spearman

All Theses

A common form of local wireless communication is defined by the IEEE as 802.11. Unfortunately, 802.11 has limitations regarding high priority traffic such as voice and data which are sensitive to jitter, delay, and loss. The IEEE 802.11e standard provides enhancements that allow traffic with specific needs to be differentiated from normal traffic. While these enhancements have been shown to effectively improve latency and throughput for high priority traffic, they do not offer precise and consistent control of performance levels for all priorities. In this work, a method to dynamically optimize 802.11e contention parameters is presented that provides more granular …

Pictures, Puzzles, And Missing Pieces: The Childlike Solution To Trauma In The Mature Novel, Natalie Couch

All Theses

Throughout literary history the child in literature has played multiple roles but was most frequently used as either a symbol for innocence or evil. In the case of three contemporary novels, Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer; The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time by Mark Haddon; and M. T. Anderson's novel entitled The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing: Traitor to the Nation, Volume I: The Pox Party, the authors use the image of the precocious child to evoke thoughts about learning and education. These three novels invite their audiences to experience an almost anti-Bildungsroman …

Dow Jones Index, Garch(1,1) And Change-Points, Tharanga Wickramarachchi

All Theses

Many econometric time series data sets, such as log returns of stocks, exhibit evidence of the so called stylized facts. Namely it is generally observed that the data itself is uncorrelated with heavy tails, but the squared data has signicant autocorrelation. For such data sets, there appears to be little or no linear information in the past about the future values of the series. Thus the class of Autoregressive Integrated moving average models (ARIMA) are not appropriate. However, there does in general appear to be information in past values of the squared data about future values of the squared data. …

Exploratory Synthesis Of Plyanion-Based Open-Framework Solids As Potential Candidates For Cathode Material Applications, Adam Siegfried

All Theses

This thesis is concerned with exploratory synthesis of polyanion based open-framework solids that can potentially be used as cathode materials in lithium batteries. Two silver manganese vanadates were discovered, Ag₃Mn(VO₄)₂ and AgMn₂V₃O₁₀, which show different possibilities as cathode materials for primary battery applications; the former contains a higher (Ag+Mn)/V ratio, which is sought for high capacity devices, while the latter may prove better for lower power devices. The structures of the two materials differ in that Ag₃Mn(VO₄)₂ is a layered material where as AgMn …

Examining 4-H Robotics In The Learning Of Science, Engineering And Technology Topics And The Related Student Attitudes, Bradley Barker, Gwen Nugent, Neal Grandgenett, Amy Hampton

Journal of Youth Development

Youths’ natural fascination and identification with robots make them an ideal teaching and learning platform. Robots would seem to be excellent hands-on tools to teach science, engineering and technology (SET) concepts. However, while research supports their use to increase interest and motivation, the effectiveness of robots to directly teach science, engineering, and technology concepts is less clear. The purpose of this study was to measure the effectiveness of a 4-H robotics program to support the learning of specific SET concepts and to examine related student attitudes towards science. This study compared the pretest and posttest scores on an assessment of …

The Tiger Vol. 102 Issue 10 2008-04-04, Clemson University

Tiger Newspapers

No abstract provided.

Youth Competitors Gain Benefits From Horse Show Judges’ Training Program, Patricia A. Evans, Scott Mckendrick, John Wesley, Justen Smith

Journal of Youth Development

This article details how youth benefit from a horse show judges’ training program. While judging is subjective, with training, judges can be more consistent in their placings, with the better horses and/or riders being placed at the top of the class. With qualified judges, youth can be more confident that they will be evaluated in a fair and consistent manner during each show all season long.

Capacity Planning Of A Commodity Cluster In An Academic Environment: A Case Study, Linh B. Ngo, Amy W. Apon, Baochuan Lu, Hung Bui, Nathan Hamm, Larry Dowdy, Doug Hoffman, Denny Brewer

Publications

In this paper, the design of a simulation model for evaluating two alternative supercomputer configurations in an academic environment is presented. The workload is analyzed and modeled, and its effect on the relative performance of both systems is studied. The Integrated Capacity Planning Environment (ICPE) toolkit, developed for commodity cluster capacity planning, is successfully applied to the target environment. The ICPE is a tool for workload modeling, simulation modeling, and what-if analysis. A new characterization strategy is applied to the workload to more accurately model commodity cluster work- loads. Through "what-if" analysis, the sensitivity of the baseline system performance to …

The Tiger Vol. 102 Issue 9 2008-03-28, Clemson University

Tiger Newspapers

No abstract provided.

The Robotic Super-Lotis Telescope: Results & Future Plans, G. G. Williams, P. A. Milne, H. S. Park, S. D. Barthelmy, Dieter H. Hartmann, A. Updike, K. Hurley

Publications

We provide an overview of the robotic Super-LOTIS (Livermore Optical Transient Imaging System) telescope and present results from gamma-ray burst (GRB) afterglow observations using Super-LOTIS and other Steward Observatory telescopes. The 0.6-m Super-LOTIS telescope is a fully robotic system dedicated to the measurement of prompt and early time optical emission from GRBs. The system began routine operations from its Steward Observatory site atop Kitt Peak in April 2000 and currently operates every clear night. The telescope is instrumented with an optical CCD camera and a four position filter wheel. It is capable of observing Swift Burst Alert Telescope (BAT) error …

Relativistic Particle-In-Cell Simulation Of Prompt And Early Afterglows From Grbs, K.-I. Nishikawa, P. Hardee, Y. Mizuno, M. Medvedev, B. Zhang, Dieter H. Hartmann, G. J. Fishman

Publications

Nonthermal radiation observed from astrophysical systems containing relativistic jets and shocks, e.g., gamma-ray bursts (GRBs), active galactic nuclei (AGNs), and microquasars commonly exibit power-law emission spectra. Recent PIC simulations of relativistic electro-ion (or electron-positron) jets injected into a stationary medium show that particle acceleration occurs within the downstream jet. In collisionless, relativistic shocks, particle (electron, positron, and ion) acceleration is due to plasma waves and their associated instabilities (e.g., the Weibel (filamentation) instability) created in shock region. The simulations show that the Weibel instability in responsible for generating and amplifying highly non-uniform, small-scale magnetic fields. These fields contribute to the …

Implications Of Cosmological Gamma-Ray Absorption. Ii. Modifications Of Gamma-Ray Spectra, Dieter H. Hartmann, T. M. Kneiske, T. Bretz, K. Mannheim

Publications

Bearing on the model for the time-dependent metagalactic radiation field developed in the first paper of this series, we compute the gamma-ray attenuation due to pair production in photon-photon scattering. Emphasis is on the effects of varying the star formation rate and the fraction of UV radiation assumed to escape from the star forming regions, the latter being important mainly for high-redshift sources. Conversely, we investigate how the metagalactic radiation field can be measured from the gamma-ray pair creation cutoff as a function of redshift, the Fazio-Stecker relation. For three observed TeV-blazars (Mkn501, Mkn421, H1426+428) we study the effects of …

Equivalences On Acyclic Orientations, Matthew Macauley, Henning S. Mortveit

Publications

The cyclic and dihedral groups can be made to act on the set Acyc(Y ) of acyclic orientations of an undirected graph Y , and this gives rise to the equivalence relations ∼κ and ∼δ, respectively. These two actions and their corresponding equivalence classes are closely related to combinatorial problems arising in the context of Coxeter groups, sequential dynamical systems, the chip-firing game, and representations of quivers.

In this paper we construct the graphs C(Y ) and D(Y ) with vertex sets Acyc(Y ) and whose connected components encode the equivalence classes. The number of connected components …

Exist's Gamma-Ray Burst Sensitivity, D. L. Band, J. E. Grindlay, A. Garson Iii, H. Krawczynski, Dieter H. Hartmann, S. Barthemy, N. Gehrels, G. Skinner

Publications

We use semianalytic techniques to evaluate the burst sensitivity of designs for the EXIST hard X-ray survey mis-sion. Applying these techniques to the mission design proposed for the Beyond Einstein program,we find that with its very large field of view and faint gamma-ray burst detection threshold, EXIST will detect and localize approximately two bursts per day, a large fraction of which may be at high redshift. We estimate that EXIST’s maximum sensitivity will be ~4 times greater than that of Swift’s Burst Alert Telescope. Bursts will be localized to better than 40" at thresh-old, with a burst position as good …

A Magnetohydrodynamic Boost For Relativistic Jets, Yosuke Mizuno, Phillip Hardee, Dieter H. Hartmann, Ken-Ichi Nishikawa, Bing Zhang

Publications

We performed relativistic magnetohydrodynamic simulations of the hydrodynamic boosting mechanism for relativistic jets explored by Aloy & Rezzolla (2006) using the RAISHIN code. Simulation results show that the presence of a magnetic field changes the properties of the shock interface between the tenuous, overpressured jet (Vzj) flowing tangentially to a dense external medium. Magnetic fields can lead to more efficient acceleration of the jet, in comparison to the pure-hydrodynamic case. A "polodial" magnetic field (Bz), tangent to the interface and parallel to the jet flow, produces both a stronger outward moving shock and a stronger inward moving rarefaction wave. This …

Nonlinear Control Strategy For Advanced Vehicle Thermal Management Systmes, John Wagner, M H. Salah, T H. Mitchell, D M. Dawson

Publications

Advanced thermal management systems for internal combustion engines can improve coolant temperature regulation and servomotor power consumption by better regulating the combustion process with multiple computer controlled electromechanical components. The traditional thermostat valve, coolant pump, and clutch-driven radiator fan are upgraded with servomotor actuators. When the system components function harmoniously, desired thermal conditions can be accomplished in a power efficient manner. In this paper, a comprehensive nonlinear control architecture is proposed for transient temperature tracking. An experimental system has been fabricated and assembled which features a variable position smart valve, variable speed electric water pump, variable speed electric radiator fan, …

Planning For College: A Comprehensive Guide For South Carolina Families, 2008, Catherine E. Watt

Publications

No abstract provided.

The Tiger Career Fair Fall 2008, Clemson University

Tiger Newspapers

No abstract provided.

The Tiger Career Fair Spring 2008, Clemson University

Tiger Newspapers

No abstract provided.