Digital Commons Network^™

Development Of A Task Analysis Tool To Estimate Shoulder Strain During A Lifting Task, Christopher Wayne Moore

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Musculoskeletal disorders of the shoulder have a huge impact on the workplace and employees. Due to the complexity and high mobility of the shoulder, developing a task analysis tool with a focus on the shoulder is difficult, and while there are some ergonomic analysis tools that do consider the shoulder to varying degrees in the analysis, none focus purely on the shoulder. Therefore, this research was undertaken in an attempt to develop a shoulder-based task analysis tool for the shoulder. However, since the scope of work involving the shoulder is so vast, the tool in this research focuses on unobstructed, …

Soil Health Assessment In Reclaimed Mine Soils, Katie Danielle Stutler

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

West Virginia is one of the top coal-producing states in the nation, which has resulted in over 500,000 acres of highly disturbed, anthropogenic mine soils caused by surface mining. Mine soils are often rocky and contain low organic matter content, low plant-available nutrients, and toxic metals, which could result in poor soil health and low productivity. Soil health has been defined as the continued capacity of soil to function as a living ecosystem that sustains plants, animals, and humans. It is assumed that with time since reclamation, mine soil properties and related functions may change, and soil health will improve …

Computational Design Of Staged Pressurized Oxy-Coal Combustion, Gideon Ozioma Udochukwu

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Staged pressurized oxy-coal combustion (SPOC) is nowadays a promising technology to be used for low-cost, low-emission, high-efficiency power generation. The objective of this thesis is to compliment the experiments ongoing at the Washington University, St. Louis (WUSTL) by means of numerical simulations, thereby providing better understanding of the fluid flow, turbulence, combustion characteristics, particle dynamics and heat transfer. Carbon dioxide (CO2) is injected alongside the coal, for its carriage. A small amount of methane (CH4) is also injected alongside the coal to maintain a steady flame. The simulations are performed for a 3D geometry with the following energy source distribution: …

Modeling Movement Of Criminals Through Burglary Scenes, Veronica L. Herrmann

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Physical evidence plays a large role in the criminal justice system and in crime scene reconstruction. The purpose of evidence is to assist in connecting a person or persons to an incidence, which helps crime scene investigators in reconstructing the events that occurred at the crime scene. This concept is mainly based off Locard's Exchange Principle, which states that there is always an association between an offender and evidence. However, without patent evidence to lead the investigators to a possible route at the scene, determining the movements taken during the commission at a scene is needed.

Engineers have used simulations …

Implications Of Sampling Methods On Geospatial Mapping Of Methane Sources, Dakota Wesley Oliver

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Natural gas is deployed as an alternative fuel due to its cost and post-combustion emissions. However, methane, the main component of natural gas, is a greenhouse gas with a global warming potential (GWP) of at least 28 over 100 years. Currently, natural gas and petroleum systems are the highest emitters of methane to the atmosphere. Using conventional methods, the detection of natural gas leaks is time consuming. Currently, natural gas production sites deploy the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Method 21 or optical gas imaging (OGI) for methane leak detection. Both methods require access to the natural gas site along with …

Evaluation Of Ultra Fine Cigarette Smoke Particles Penetration On 3m 6200 Half Mask Respirators With P-100 Filters, Selcuk Elhan

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

This study was aimed to investigate the effectiveness of half mask respirator with double P-100 filters by determining the penetration of cigarette smoke particles. In this study, faceseal leakage of a breathing manikin donned a 3M 6200 half mask elastomeric respirator with double P-100 filters was determined at various test conditions. A full factorial test conditions of 4 sealing conditions (Non-sealed, only nose sealed, nose and chin sealed, and fully sealed), 2 inspiratory breathing types (Constant, cyclic), 4 flowing rates (15, 30, 50, 85 L/min for cyclic; 15, 30, 50, 80 L/min for constant) were employed and each test condition …

Three Essays On Utilizing Spatial Econometrics In Natural Resource Economics Related To Water, Health, And Energy, Elham Erfanian

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Spatial interaction and the locational structure between observations have recently gained more attention in the field of econometrics for both cross-sectional and panel data analyses. Compared to a non-spatial economic model, a spatial model relaxes the assumption of independency in observations. This research will apply spatial econometrics modeling in three different fields in applied economics: 1) water charge and minimum monthly access charge in West Virginia municipalities, 2) Naloxone access law and opioid overdose deaths among the U.S. states, and 3) ��2.5 concentrations and asthma hospitalizations in Pennsylvania counties. Based on the nature of water resource imposing spillovers in water …

Towards A Framework For Smart Manufacturing Adoption In Small And Medium-Sized Enterprises, Sameer Mittal

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Smart Manufacturing (SM) paradigm adoption can scale production with demand without compromising on the time for order fulfillment. A smart manufacturing system (SMS) is vertically and horizontally connected, and thus it can minimize the chances of miscommunication. Employees in an SME are aware of the operational requirements and their responsibilities. The machine schedules are prepared based on the tasks a machine must perform. Predictive maintenance reduces the downtime of machines. Design software optimizes the product design. Production feasibility is checked with the help of simulation. The concepts of product life cycle management are considered for waste reduction. Employee safety, and …

Regulator Of G Protein Signaling-12 (Rgs12) In Dopaminergic And Kappa Opioid Receptor-Dependent Signaling And Behavior, Joshua David Gross

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Dopaminergic neurotransmission is critically involved in the etiology and treatment of many psychiatric and neurological disorders. One modulator of dopaminergic neurotransmission is the kappa opioid receptor (KOR) -- a G protein-coupled receptor (GPCR) that is densely expressed within dopaminergic neurons and circuits. GPCRs are tightly regulated by a variety of intracellular signaling molecules, including Regulator of G Protein Signaling (RGS) proteins. Canonically, RGS proteins act as GTPase accelerating proteins (GAPs) on GTP-bound Ga subunits following GPCR activation, thereby hastening the rate at which GPCR-mediated G protein signaling is terminated. However, some RGS proteins exhibit more complex mechanisms of action on …

Automatic Detection Of Insecure Codes In Stack Overflow, Shifu Hou

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

As the popularity of modern social coding paradigm such as Stack Overflow grows, its potential security risks increase as well (e.g., insecure codes could be easily embedded and distributed). To address this largely overlooked issue, we bring a new insight to exploit social coding properties in addition to code content for automatic detection of insecure code snippets in Stack Overflow. To determine if the given code snippets are insecure, we not only analyze the code content, but also utilize various kinds of relations among users, badges, questions, answers, code snippets and keywords in Stack Overflow. To model the rich semantic …

Investigation Of Heat Exchanger Effectiveness Using A Surface Coating Technology, Allen Duffy

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Diesel engine manufacturers continue to improve engine performance through increased thermal efficiency and reduced regulated emissions. The aftercooler located between the turbocharger air outlet and intake manifold experiences a wide range of operating conditions. Improving the heat transfer characteristics in the aftercooler can lead towards improved engine performance through increased charge air density. A surface coating has been proposed to enhance the heat transfer characteristics for a marine-based application on the water - side of the heat exchanger. To evaluate the efficacy of the coating, the rate of heat transfer with and without the coating was quantified in a controlled …

Leveraging Writing And Photography Styles For Drug Trafficker Identification In Darknet Markets, Wei Song

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Due to its anonymity, there has been a dramatic growth of underground drug markets hosted in the darknet (e.g., Dream Market and Valhalla). To combat drug trafficking (a.k.a. illicit drug trading) in the cyberspace, there is an urgent need for automatic analysis of participants in darknet markets. However, one of the key challenges is that drug traffickers (i.e., vendors) may maintain multiple accounts across different markets or within the same market.

To address this issue, in this thesis, we propose and develop an intelligent system named uStyle-uID leveraging both writing and photography styles for drug trafficker identification at the first …

Optimizing The Production And Injection Wells Flow Rates In Geothermal Field Using Artificial Intelligence, Muhammet Salih Ariturk

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

In a geothermal field, power plants are designed for long-term electricity generation. Therefore, it is crucial to predict the future production and injection flow rates of the wells to determine the capacity of a power plant. In the designing of such power plants, calculations and estimations are based on the current future production, and injection flow rates and pressures in the geothermal field. Prediction of future production and injection flow rates also assist in building surface facilities with cost-efficient power plants. The most common problem in a power plant in geothermal fields is the inability to accurately estimate future expected …

Scaling Analysis And Experimental Investigation Of A Rotating Detonation Engine, David Thomas Billups

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Pressure gain combustion (PGC) technologies, specifically rotating detonation engines (RDEs), are poised to provide the next big leap in gas turbine engine advancement, significantly increasing the thermal. RDEs make use of thermodynamic advantages of isochoric as opposed to isobaric combustion. Theorized to increase thermal efficiency by up to 7% [1], the RDE would have significant impact on reducing anthropogenic carbon emissions. In addition to efficiency gains, the RDE also provides mechanical simplicity and reduced size advantages compared to it’s traditional counterparts and PGC competition.

The United States (U.S.) Department of Energy (DOE) National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) maintains and operates …

Evaluating The Approach Of Using Nox Control Performance Tracking For On-Board Diagnostics Of Heavy-Duty Diesel Vehicles, Renata Castiglioni

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

egulatory agencies have taken several measures to ensure proper regulation of engine exhaust in response to a yearly rise in urban pollution levels. This is due in no small part to vehicular traffic and resulting air pollution from exhaust.

This study evaluates the NOx Control Performance Tracking (NCPT) Onboard Diagnostic (OBD) parameter proposed by the California Air Resources Board (CARB) as a tool to assess in-use heavy-duty vehicle performance. It also assesses the various criteria prescribed in the NCPT approach for applicability to real-world vehicle data.

In order to analyze the data, the study also investigated the effect of various …

The Impact Of Student Facilitation On Student Engagement In Asynchronous Online Discussion, Robin Bowen

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Lack of engagement in asynchronous online discussion is a common issue due to insufficient participation, disinterest in discussion, superficial discussion, and the influence of peer behaviors. The purpose of this study was to enhance student engagement in asynchronous online discussion by using student-led discussion and peer assessment. A mixed methods design was utilized in this study to offset quantitative and qualitative research weaknesses and to draw on the strengths of both (Plano Clark & Creswell, 2008). The control group participated in the discussion managed by the instructor, who posted weekly discussion questions to a class discussion board and facilitated the …

Elucidating A Common Mechanism Of Proteasome Impairment In Neurodegenerative Disease And Its Pharmacological Intervention, Tiffany Ann Thibaudeau

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Proteostasis is maintained by several systems in the cell including the ubiquitin-proteasome system (UPS), chaperones, chaperone-mediated autophagy, and macroautophagy. The UPS is the principle route for the degradation of intracellular misfolded, damaged, or unneeded cellular proteins and has a critical role essential every cell process, including: cell cycle progression, transcriptional regulation, genome integrity, apoptosis, immune responses, and neuronal plasticity. When the efficiency of protein degradation is perturbed, misfolded and damaged protein aggregates can accumulate to toxic levels and cause neuronal dysfunction, which may underlie many neurodegenerative diseases. It is widely appreciated that soluble oligomers of misfolded proteins (e.g. Aβ, Alzheimer’s; …

Design And Implementation Of An Instantaneous Fuel Mass Flow Measurement System For Use In Verification Of Locomotive Emissions, Adam Wayne James

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Located in Altoona, PA, the Juniata Thoroughbred Emissions Research lab has provided emissions testing and research for several locomotive companies such as CSX, Electro Motive Diesel (EMD), and General Electric (GE). The emissions laboratory measures locomotive emissions through partial flow dilution (PFD) sampling for particulate matter (PM) using a Sierra Instruments BG3 and measures raw gaseous emissions using a MEXA 7100D gaseous emission analyzer. Fuel consumption is measured on a gravimetric basis and is used in verification of proportional sampling of exhaust flow. There were two research goals for this study which were (1) verify that the emissions measurement system …

Accessible Design In Rural Health Care: Usability Profile Of Outpatient Health Care Facilities In Rural West Virginia., Jordan E. Miller

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) became law in 1990. Since then, research has shown that people with disabilities continue to experience environmental, systematic, and structural barriers to health care. The purpose of this research is to explore the prevalence of barriers in rural West Virginia health facilities and the relationship between building characteristics (like age and purpose) and accessibility. The researcher evaluated ten rural outpatient member-sites of the West Virginia Practice-Based Research Network using a survey to understand building characteristics and a tool to measure essential features for a facility to be considered ‘usable’. Findings included a negative correlation …

Pharmaceutical Scheduling Using Simulated Annealing And Steepest Descent Method, Bryant Jamison Spencer

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

In the pharmaceutical manufacturing world, a deadline could be the difference between losing a multimillion-dollar contract or extending it. This, among many other reasons, is why good scheduling methods are vital. This problem report addresses Flexible Flowshop (FF) scheduling using Simulated Annealing (SA) in conjunction with the Steepest Descent heuristic (SD).

FF is a generalized version of the flowshop problem, where each product goes through S number of stages, where each stage has M number of machines. As opposed to a normal flowshop problem, all ‘jobs’ do not have to flow in the same sequence from stage to stage. The …

Online Model Predictive Control Of A Nonisothermal And Nonisobaric Membrane Reactor For Water-Gas Shift Reaction Applications, Jacob Martin Douglas

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Online Model Predictive Control of a Nonisothermal and Nonisobaric Membrane Reactor for Water-Gas Shift Reaction Applications Jacob M. Douglas Modern hydrogen production units are tasked with producing the most hydrogen possible while dealing with flow variations caused by changing power demands. Classical methods for hydrogen production employing the water-gas shift reaction are governed by equilibrium limitations that take effect at high temperatures and high concentrations of H2 (Georgis, et al., 2014). The implementation of a membrane reactor with temperature control enables the hydrogen concentration and temperature to reach an equilibrium at a higher concentration of H2. Another challenge that is …

Distribution And Habitat Use Of Benthic Fishes In The Lower Kanawha River, West Virginia, Nathaniel V. Owens

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The Kanawha River in West Virginia is a historically diverse system in terms of ichthyofauna although, like many other large rivers, it has been subjected to a suite of anthropomorphic perturbations. These include this system being modified to allow the passage of commercial vessels for industry thus altering flow regimes, increased sedimentation, water depth, and channelization, and decreased interactions with its floodplain. Additionally, the fishes of this system have suffered from deleterious historical water quality issues caused by intensive timber operations, mining, and industrial waste. Post Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, and Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act water …

Intelligent Malware Detection Using File-To-File Relations And Enhancing Its Security Against Adversarial Attacks, Lingwei Chen

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

With computing devices and the Internet being indispensable in people's everyday life, malware has posed serious threats to their security, making its detection of utmost concern. To protect legitimate users from the evolving malware attacks, machine learning-based systems have been successfully deployed and offer unparalleled flexibility in automatic malware detection. In most of these systems, resting on the analysis of different content-based features either statically or dynamically extracted from the file samples, various kinds of classifiers are constructed to detect malware. However, besides content-based features, file-to-file relations, such as file co-existence, can provide valuable information in malware detection and make …

Multimodal Approach For Malware Detection, Jarilyn M. Hernandez Jimenez

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Although malware detection is a very active area of research, few works were focused on using physical properties (e.g., power consumption) and multimodal features for malware detection. We designed an experimental testbed that allowed us to run samples of malware and non-malicious software applications and to collect power consumption, network traffic, and system logs data, and subsequently to extract dynamic behavioral-based features. We also extracted code-based static features of both malware and non-malicious software applications. These features were used for malware detection based on: feature level fusion using power consumption and network traffic data, feature level fusion using network traffic …

Bending Response Of Timber Mortise And Tenon Joints Reinforced With Filler-Modules And Frp Gussets, Andrew Robert Pacifico

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

In 2013, the California Bay Area (CBA) passed a set of ordinances to ensure that their 10,000 plus timber soft-story buildings were prepared for seismic events, through nondestructive evaluation methods. Many property owners are searching for an affordable retrofitting system that will also meet CBA’s new laws focusing on installations by the mandated deadlines in 2020. Over the past three to four decades, Fiber Reinforced Polymer (FRP) composites have found their way into the civil infrastructure sector for rehabilitation. The objective of this study is to evaluate the bending behavior retrofitted mortise and tenon timber joints reinforced with engineered wood …

Domain Adaptation And Privileged Information For Visual Recognition, Saeid Motiian

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The automatic identification of entities like objects, people or their actions in visual data, such as images or video, has significantly improved, and is now being deployed in access control, social media, online retail, autonomous vehicles, and several other applications. This visual recognition capability leverages supervised learning techniques, which require large amounts of labeled training data from the target distribution representative of the particular task at hand. However, collecting such training data might be expensive, require too much time, or even be impossible. In this work, we introduce several novel approaches aiming at compensating for the lack of target training …

Developing A Strategic Process To Reintroduce A Lost Water Way As A Possible Solution For Water Logging: Case Study, An Area Of Dhaka Metropolitan City, Debsree Mandal

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

During the rainy season, Dhaka, the capital city of Bangladesh, faces tremendous rainfall which is annually 1600mm-2000 mm and it is increasing at a rate of 55.90 mm/year. So, in monsoon, some areas of this city suffer from water logging which continues from 3 hours up to two feet to more than one day. It increases the hazards for everyday life for the city dwellers, especially in the transportation and working sectors of the city which follows other socio-economic, health and environmental problem.

Dhaka is one of the most populous cities in the world. This area is almost flat and …

Investigation Of Various Factors Affecting Quantification And Characterization Accuracy Of Nox Measurement At Near Zero Level In A Cvs Sampling Set-Up, Samuel Abimbola Ogunfuye

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Accurate measurement of oxides of nitrogen (NOx) concentrations at near-zero levels using the constant volume sampling (CVS) system is a critical consideration in emissions quantification for engine and vehicle research and certification purposes. Various technological efforts and research are being implemented to ensure emissions from automobile and on-road transportation sources tend towards lower concentrations. This development has resulted in NOx concentration measurements to shift towards near-zero and thus, reach the detection limits of traditional measurement approaches and methods. There are several factors that might deter achieving measurement accuracy at this level, as their effect becomes significant at low NOx concentrations. …

Propagation And Morphology Of Premixed Flames In Obstructed Channels Under Atmospheric And Supercritical Conditions, Abdulafeez Akinola Adebiyi

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

The understanding of the morphology and propagation of premixed flames in channels is vital for the design and development of efficient propulsion systems requiring high heat release, such as pulse detonation engines, and for resolving accidental fire in industrial conduits. In this work, extensive computational simulation of premixed flames in channels (with rectangular and cylindrical cross sections) with closely packed obstacles are carried out with the goal of providing insights into flame propagation under various conditions which would be invaluable to the development and safety of energy and propulsion systems as well as for the mitigation of accidental fires in …

Genet-Cnv: Boolean Implication Networks For Modeling Genome-Wide Co-Occurrence Of Dna Copy Number Variations, Salvi Singh

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer-related death in the world. Lung cancer can be categorized as non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and small cell lung cancer (SCLC). NSCLC makes up about 80% to 85% of lung cancer cases diagnosed, whereas SCLC is responsible for 10% to 15% of the cases. It remains a challenge for physicians to identify patients who shall benefit from chemotherapy. In such a scenario, identifying genes that can facilitate therapeutic target discoveries and better understanding disease mechanisms and their regulation in different stages of lung cancer, remains an important topic of research.

In this …