Digital Commons Network^™

Reachable Sets For Safe, Real-Time Manipulator Trajectory Design, Patrick Holmes, Shreyas Kousik, Bohao Zhang, Daphna Raz, Corina Barbalata, Matthew Johnson-Roberson, Ram Vasudevan

Faculty Publications

For robotic arms to operate in arbitrary environments, especially near people, it is critical to certify the safety of their motion planning algorithms. However, there is often a trade-o↵ between safety and real-time performance; one can either carefully design safe plans, or rapidly generate potentially-unsafe plans. This work presents a receding-horizon, real-time trajectory planner with safety guarantees, called ARMTD (Au-tonomous Reachability-based Manipulator Trajectory Design). The method first computes (o✏ine) a reachable set of parameterized trajectories for each joint of an arm. Each trajectory includes a fail-safe maneuver (braking to a stop). At runtime, in each receding-horizon planning iteration, ARMTD constructs …

Severe Air Pollution Events Not Avoided By Reduced Anthropogenic Activities During Covid-19 Outbreak, P F. Wang, K Y. Chen, S Q. Zhu, P Wang, P F. Wang

Faculty Publications

Due to the pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 in China, almost all avoidable activities in China are prohibited since Wuhan announced lockdown on January 23, 2020. With reduced activities, severe air pollution events still occurred in the North China Plain, causing discussions regarding why severe air pollution was not avoided. The Community Multi-scale Air Quality model was applied during January 01 to February 12, 2020 to study PM2.5 changes under emission reduction scenarios. The estimated emission reduction case (Case 3) better reproduced PM2.5. Compared with the case without emission change (Case 1), Case 3 predicted that PM2.5 concentrations decreased by …

Peak Pressures On Low Rise Buildings: Cfd With Les Versus Full Scale And Wind Tunnel Measurements, Aly Mousaad Aly, Hamzeh Gol-Zaroudi

Faculty Publications

This paper focuses on the processes of wind flow in the atmospheric boundary layer, to produce realistic full-scale pressures for the design of low-rise buildings. CFD with LES turbulence closure is implemented on a scale 1:1 prototype building. A proximity study was executed computationally in CFD with LES that suggests new recommendations on the computational domain size, in front of a building model, apart from common RANS-based guidelines (e.g. COST and AIJ). Our findings suggest a location of the test building, different from existing guidelines, and the inflow boundary proximity influences pressure correlation and reproduction of peak loads. The CFD …

Three Dimensional Finite Element Model Of A Partially Continuous Joint, Marco Canales, Ayman Okeil

Faculty Publications

A detailed three-dimensional finite element model of a bridge joint with link slab continuity was developed and subjected to the same loading conditions as a three-dimensional finite element model of a bridge joint with a continuity diaphragm. Support conditions and material properties were homogenized between both models, and in order to determine the equivalent loading resulting from temperature gradient, a validated simplified line model was used. Displacements and rotations were then determined for the conditions in the detailed 3D model using the simplified line model and were applied to the corresponding elements in the 3D model. Results showed a different …

Wettability Effects On Primary Drainage Mechanisms And Napl Distribution: A Pore-Scale Study, Ian L. Molnar, Jason I. Gerhard, Clinton S. Willson, Denis M. O'Carroll

Faculty Publications

The pore-scale processes governing water drainage behavior in porous media have implications for geoscience multiphase scenarios including carbon capture and storage, contaminant site remediation, oil recovery, and vadose zone processes. However, few studies report directly observed pore-scale water drainage phenomena in 3-D soils. This knowledge gap limits our ability to verify assumptions underlying existing models and develop optimal solutions. This paper utilizes synchrotron X-ray microtomography to present an experimental pore-scale examination of nonaqueous phase liquid (NAPL)/water distribution along a primary drainage front as dense NAPL was injected upward into water wetting (WW) and intermediate wetting (IW) sand-packed columns. Pore-network structures …

Investigation Of Deformation Induced Micro To Macro Scale Surface Roughness, Ayotunde Olayinka, William J. Emblom, Scott W. Wagner, Michael Khonsari, Ali Haghshenas

Faculty Publications

In the present work the relationship between deformation and deformation induced surface roughness of 100 micron thick annealed AISI 304 stainless steel was investigated at the meso scale. This work is a continuation of the previous work by the authors where roughness values were determined at the apex of the bulge test samples at micro scale. The apex is believed to be the region of highest stress and strain in a typical bulge process in a circular die. The material was deformed using a biaxial bulge test through hydraulic fluid pressure. The strains on the workpieces were measured with respect …

On The Wear Of Dynamically-Loaded Engine Bearings With Provision For Misalignment And Surface Roughness, J. Y. Jang, M. M. Khonsari

Faculty Publications

A computational model is developed to assess the effect of wear on the performance of an engine bearing. The model takes into account the variation of the film thickness under dynamic loading due to the wear of the bearing surface and shaft misalignment. The model adopts the mass-conservative cavitation algorithm to account for cavitation. To consider the surface roughness, the average flow model for the hydrodynamic pressure and the Kogut and Etsion model for the elastic-plastic contact pressure are implemented. A method for assessment of wear over long-term operation of an engine bearing to avoid failure is provided. To gain …

Management Of Frequent Ed Users By Community Paramedics Improves Patient Experiences And Reduces Ems Utilization, Oluwakemi Aiyedun Adio, Laura H. Ikuma, Sonja D. Wiley

Faculty Publications

This study examined a suburban emergency medical system (EMS)-led community paramedicine (CP) program in terms of adherence to protocol, patient-paramedic interactions, patient experience, and cost. Participants (n=57) are frequent emergency department (ED) users (≥ 4 ED visits/year), with a mean age of 59.8±17.6 years and have multiple chronic conditions. Of these, 36 completed a modified Clinician and Group Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems (CG-CAHPS) survey at 3- and 6-months following program enrollment. The main outcome measures were adherence to intake goals; types, modes, and frequencies of CP interventions; CG-CAHPS patient experience scores; and cost savings. Cost savings compared …

First Person: The Pandemic's Silver Lining: Real Talk For Future Teachers, J Hipp

Faculty Publications

When the COVID-19 pandemic closed her university campus, Jamie Hipp had to move her popular arts integration class for preservice teachers to a virtual format. She was surprised to learn that her students wanted more than regular sessions during their scheduled class times; they wanted additional opportunities for real teacher talk about going on interviews, setting up a classroom, and other practical matters that weren't being covered in their preservice program. Hipp set up a series of virtual sessions on topics of interest to students, in addition to regular class sessions. The sessions went so well that Hipp intends to …

The Life And Legal Legacy Of Justice Steven L. Zinter, Neil Fulton

Faculty Publications

Justice Steven L. Zinter was a vital part of South Dakota's legal landscape for decades. As a private practitioner, circuit court judge, supreme court justice, and in other official capacities, he forged a powerful legacy in South Dakota. Over the course of his time he worked on cases large and small in many areas of law. He was recognized as a brilliant legal mind, precise writer, and careful thinker. It is a challenge to capture the breadth and depth of such a career. This article takes a look at his personal formation, his legal work in several settings, and how …

The Homesteading Rights Of Deserted Wives: A History, Hannah Haksgaard

Faculty Publications

During the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the federal government of the United States distributed 270 million acres of land to homesteaders. The federal land-grant legislation allowed single women, but not married women, to partake in homesteading. Existing in a “legal netherworld” between single and married, deserted wives did not have clear rights under the federal legislation, much like deserted wives did not have clear rights in American marital law. During the homesteading period, many deserted wives litigated claims in front of the Department of the Interior, arguing they had the right to homestead. This is the first article …

Mass Seizure And Mass Search, Gregory Brazeal

Faculty Publications

As courts attempt to develop Fourth Amendment doctrine to address the threats to privacy created by digital surveillance technologies, a valuable doctrinal resource has been largely neglected: the law governing the seizure of persons. Just as courts today struggle with the specter of mass search using digital technologies, courts in the 1960s were confronted with the problem of mass seizure through the growing use of stop-and-frisk by police departments. The responses to mass seizure developed by the Supreme Court in Terry v. Ohio, 592 U.S. 1 (1968), and its progeny provide lessons for courts today considering how to respond to …

Christian Purpose Trusts, Thomas Simmons

Faculty Publications

Noncharitable purpose trusts are recognized under the Uniform Trust Code and the non-uniform laws of many jurisdictions. In 2019, Oregon enacted a stewardship trust statutory scheme. A stewardship trust is a purpose trust which is designed to hold and preserve corporate stock. Properly drafted, a stewardship trust can soften the indefatigable pursuit of profits that drive corporate entities. A stewardship trust can substitute ethical ideals - at least in part - for shareholder return. The purpose trust statutes of other jurisdictionscould also partially permit ambitions similar to those which motivated the Oregon legislation to be realized. The concept of a …

Saint Paul’S Trial Narrative In Acts: Imperium Rōmānum Vs. Vasileía Tou Theoú, Thomas Simmons

Faculty Publications

Saul of Tarsus (alias Paul) encountered the resurrected Christ on the road to Damascus. Thereupon, Paul not only became a follower of "the Way," he went from an aggressive persecutor of early Christians to one of its most intellectual and influential apostles. Towards the end of his life, he went on trial. Saint Paul's trial in first century Judea before Felix and Festus receive a detailed fleshing-out in the Acts of the Apostles. A quasi-prosecutor even briefly appears. But Paul's subsequent legal proceedings in Rome and his execution there are excluded from the narrative. Meanwhile, Acts portrays Christianity as a …

The Trial Of Breaker Morant, Jonathan Van Patten

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Trial Of Jesus, Jonathan Van Patten

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Twenty-Five Propositions For The Practice Of Law, Jonathan Van Patten

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Effects Of The Laidback Fan-Shaped Hole Geometry On Film Cooling Performance Using Large Eddy Simulation, Hakun Jang, Mayank Tyagi

Faculty Publications

The higher temperature of the combustion chamber of a gas turbine yield higher efficiencies for the turbines but can affect the blade’s life. As a preventative method, Film-cooling is a useful technique to enhance the performance of it by injecting coolant jets that the metal surfaces can be protected against the hot main flow. To improve cooling efficiency and increase the life of these components, several cooling strategies have been introduced. In the present study, the effects of the laidback fan-shaped hole geometry, in particular, are examined against the conventional cylindrical hole geometry using Computational Fluid Dynamic simulations. Computations are …

Is Authorship Sufficient For Today’S Collaborative Research? A Call For Contributor Roles, Nicole A. Vasilevsky, Ehsan Mohammadi, Mohammad Hosseini, Samantha Teplitzky, Violeta Ilik, Juliane Schneider, Barbara Kern, Julien Colomb, Scott C. Edmunds, Karen Gutzman, Daniel S. Himmelstein, Marijane White, Britton Smith, Lisa O'Keefe, Melissa Haendel, Kristi L. Holmes

Faculty Publications

Assigning authorship and recognizing contributions to scholarly works is challenging on many levels. Here we discuss ethical, social, and technical challenges to the concept of authorship that may impede the recognition of contributions to a scholarly work. Recent work in the field of authorship shows that shifting to a more inclusive contributorship approach may address these challenges. Recent efforts to enable better recognition of contributions to scholarship include the development of the Contributor Role Ontology (CRO), which extends the CRediT taxonomy and can be used in information systems for structuring contributions. We also introduce the Contributor Attribution Model (CAM), which …

The Value Of An Academic Law Library In The 21st Century, Anne Klinefelter

Faculty Publications

Law school deans and university provosts may ask how law libraries can deliver value as new technologies, practices, and economic pressures inspire reassessment of legal education and of higher education more generally. The proliferation of information delivery systems, trends towards centralized management of higher education infrastructure, and changes in the law practice market suggest that the traditional law library may not meet current needs. But law libraries have the potential and opportunity to deliver strong value in this environment due largely to the sophistication of today's law librarians. The law library can be a center for expertise that can advance …

The Ends And Means Of Decarbonization: The Green New Deal In Context, Jonas J. Monast

Faculty Publications

Disputes about climate policy involve much more than whether or not to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. There is general agreement among proponents of climate policy that strategies should be cost effective, address distributional impacts, and incentivize investments in low-carbon technologies. Yet disagreements abound regarding additional goals of climate policy design.

Decarbonizing the economy means changing the sources of energy we use, how we transport people and products, how we produce food, and which resources we consume. Yet even among proponents of federal climate legislation there is strong disagreement regarding policy instruments. Recent proposals for a revenue-neutral carbon tax and a …

Protecting The Role Of The Press In Times Of Crisis, Mary-Rose Papandrea

Faculty Publications

Part I of this Article will discuss defamation law with a focus on the Court’s decision in New York Times Co. v. Sullivan. This decision “constitutionalized” the common law tort of defamation and dealt a death blow to a series of lawsuits by southern government officials aimed at silencing the publication.14 The decision has since provided an essential foundation for press freedom for over fifty years. At the same time, because the decision did not grant the press (or the public generally) absolute immunity for the publication of defamatory information about matters of public concern, speakers potentially face years …

Legal Writing's Harmful Psyche, Kevin Bennardo

Faculty Publications

This essay proceeds in four parts. It first supports the descriptive claim that many in the legal writing discipline perceive themselves as victims of unfair treatment within legal academia. Second, it explores the consequences of that self-perception, including the norm of protectionism that has developed within the discipline. The narrative that legal writing professors are mistreated by those outside the discipline has resulted in an internal culture in which many members of the discipline support their own no matter what.

Third, the essay explores how such protectionism is harmful to the development of the legal writing discipline. An academic discipline …

Bot Contracts, Deborah R. Gerhardt, David Thaw

Faculty Publications

In this Article, we explain why the transactions commonly known as “smart contracts” are better understood as “bot contracts.” Taking an interdisciplinary approach, we show why the “smart contracts” moniker is misdescriptive in two important ways. First, these transactions are automated, not smart. Second, they do not afford parties many enforcement rights and defenses that one expects from common law contractual relationships. To fully understand these transactions, it is important to appreciate how the term “smart contracts” differs from what the technology delivers.

Our review of the technology explains that these transactions have tremendous practical utility in reducing risk and …

Legal Calculators And The Tax System, Joshua D. Blank, Leigh Z. Osofsky

Faculty Publications

Legal calculators often embody a characteristic that can be termed “simplexity.” As we have theorized, simplexity occurs when the government presents clear and simple explanations of the law without highlighting its underlying complexity or reducing this complexity through formal legal changes. In earlier work, we have argued that some elements of IRS publications (plain language summaries of the law for the general public) present contested tax law as clear tax rules, add administrative gloss to the tax law, and fail to fully explain the tax law.

In this Article, we show that simplexity also occurs when the government offers legal …

The First Anti-Sanctuary Law: Proposition 187 And The Transformation Of Immigration Enforcement, Rick Su

Faculty Publications

Anti-sanctuary efforts are sweeping the country, as the federal government and a growing number of states impose stringent restrictions on the ability of cities and other localities to limit their involvement in federal immigration enforcement. Many are now wondering how far this movement will go. But where and how did this movement begin? This Essay argues that the roots of the contemporary anti-sanctuary movement can be traced to Proposition 187, a ballot initiative adopted by California voters in 1994. As the nation’s first anti-sanctuary law, Proposition 187 established the basic provisions featured in nearly every anti-sanctuary measure enacted since. Moreover, …

The Death Of Custom: Winners And Losers In The Legal Transformation Of Peri-Urban Land In Niger, Thomas A. Kelley Iii

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Future Work, Jeffrey M. Hirsch

Faculty Publications

The Industrial Revolution. The Digital Age. These revolutions radi-cally altered the workplace and society. We may be on the cusp of a new era -- one that will rival or even surpass these historical disruptions. Technology such as artificial intelligence, robotics, virtual reality, and cutting-edge monitoring devices are developing at a rapid pace. These technologies have already begun to infiltrate the workplace and will continue to do so at ever increasing speed and breadth.

This Article addresses the impact of these emerging technologies on the workplace of the present and the future. Drawing upon interviews with leading technologists, the Article …

Automated Legal Guidance, Leigh Z. Osofsky, Joshua D. Blank

Faculty Publications

Through online tools, virtual assistants, and other technology, governments increasingly rely on artificial intelligence to help the public understand and apply the law. The Internal Revenue Service, for example, encourages taxpayers to seek answers regarding various tax credits and deductions through its online “Interactive Tax Assistant.” The U.S. Army directs individuals with questions about enlistment to its virtual guide, “Sgt. Star.” And the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services suggests that potential green card holders and citizens speak with its interactive chatbot, “Emma.” Through such automated legal guidance, the government seeks to provide advice to the public at a fraction of …

What Is Open Source Software (Oss) And What Is Big Data?, Richard S. Segall

Faculty Publications

This chapter discusses what Open Source Software is and its relationship to Big Data and how it differs from other types of software and its software development cycle. Open source software (OSS) is a type of computer software in which source code is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to study, change, and distribute the software to anyone and for any purpose. Big Data are data sets that are so voluminous and complex that traditional data processing application software are inadequate to deal with them. Big data can be discrete or a continuous …