Digital Commons Network^™

Comparison Of The Effects Of Three Surgical Techniques On The Rate Of Orthodontic Tooth Movement In A Rat Model, Zachary T. Librizzi

Master's Theses

No abstract provided.

Autoignition Of Methyl Pentanoate At Low To Intermediate Temperatures And Elevated Pressures In A Rapid Compression Machine, Justin Bunnell

Master's Theses

Autoignition experiments were performed in a rapid compression machine for methyl pentanoate. Autoignition conditions ranged from 682 K to 1048 K for pressures of 15 bar and 30 bar and equivalence ratios of 0.25, 0.50, and 1.0. The composition of the oxidizer was altered by changing the amount of argon and molecular nitrogen in the mixtures. Over the conditions studied, it was found that the reactivity of the mixture increases with increasing compressed pressure and equivalence ratio. Negative temperature coefficient behavior was observed for compressed temperatures ranging from 716 K to 799 K under a compressed pressure of 30 bar …

An Analysis Of Juvenile Chinook Salmon Outmigration Speed And Survival In Response To Habitat Features: Sacramento River From Knights Landing To Sacramento, California, Natalie N. Mcnair

Master's Theses

Outmigration is an important life stage for Chinook salmon (Oncorhynchus tshawytscha) survival in the Sacramento River, and yet our understanding of their behavior and needs during this time is limited. To gain a better understanding of their survival and movement rates during outmigration, late fall run Chinook salmon smolts were tracked using acoustic telemetry techniques. Habitat features were measured and quantified throughout the study area to evaluate how Chinook salmon respond to key levee features including shade, instream woody material, and aquatic vegetation. The overall average movement speed through the entire study area was 0.77 m/s with an …

Characterization Of Pressure-Driven And Electro-Kinetically Driven Flow In A Micro-Fluidic Chip Using Particle Imaging Velocimetry, Alexis Weckel

Master's Theses

The flow profiles of pressure-driven and electro-kinetic driven flows were compared for a microfluidic chip. It was found that the pressure-driven flow had a parabolic profile while the electro-kinetic flow had a plug shaped flow profile. The measured velocities were similar to those determined by the Poiseuille flow model and the Helmholtz-Smoltchowski equation. Flow uniformity is very important for control in microfluidic mixers. Parabolic flow profiles lead to inconsistent reactions while the more uniform plug shape flow allow for a more steady reaction across the channel. Previous work had been performed to measure the flow of a solution of fluorescent …

Analysis Of The United States Hop Market, Michael W. Dasso

Master's Theses

Hops are one of the four main ingredients used to produce beer. Many studies have been done to analyze the science behind growing and harvesting hops, creating hop hybrids, and how to brew beer with hops. However, there has been little research done revolving around the economic demand and supply model of the hop market. The objectives of this study are to create an econometric model of supply and demand of hops in the United States from 1981 to 2012, and to identify important exogenous variables that explain the supply and demand of hops using the two-stage least squares (2SLS) …

Polymer Transcrystallization Induced By Carbon Nanotube And Graphene Fibers, John Abdou

Master's Theses

Carbon nanomaterials provide applications in a wide variety of roles, including as reinforcing materials, thermal and electrical conductors, and optical absorbers. While their benefits can be applied as bulk materials, their implementation into polymer materials as fillers allows for efficient enhanced properties with a small amount of material. These blended materials, referred to as nanocomposites, integrate the beneficial properties of both the polymer and carbon nanomaterials to create cheap solutions to construction and product development that bulk materials could not accomplish. However, major challenges must be overcome to allow for their adoption in industry. Among these problems is the interfacial …

Dialogue Education Is Effective As A Method To Teach Maternal Toddler Feeding Practices, Grace Voorheis

Master's Theses

Title: Dialogue education is effective as a method to teach maternal toddler feeding practices

Objectives: 1) Measure the effectiveness of one or two workshops using dialogue education to teach healthy toddler feeding practices, specifically a) to allow child self-regulation of satiety, b) to maintain a schedule for meals and snacks and c) to role-model healthy eating when compared to a control group. 2) Measure the effectiveness of dialogue education to teach appropriate stages of growth in order to increase mothers’ ability to know when their children are at a healthy weight compared to a control group

3)Compare baseline maternal …

A Risk Analysis Model For The Maintenance And Rehabilitation Of Pipes In A Water Distribution System: A Statistical Approach, Hernan Cortez

Master's Theses

ABSTRACT

The network of pipes in potable water distribution systems (WDS) are comprised of thousands of pipes made of various materials including PVC, concrete, cast iron, and steel, among several others. The pipes are subjected to internal and external conditions that lead to their failure. Stress conditions include, but are not limited to internal pressures, traffic loading, and corrosion. The deterioration of a pipe decreases its mechanical strength which results in an increase of its probability of failure. Failures lead to loss of service which translates to loss of money due to the cost of repairs and buildup of traffic …

Analysis Of Particles Thorough The Aortic Arch During Transcatheter Aortic Valve Replacement, Andrew Joseph Janicki

Master's Theses

Ischemia caused by particles becoming dislodged during transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) is a possible complication of TAVR. The particles that become dislodged can travel out of the aortic valve, into the aortic arch, and then into either the brachiocephalic artery, the left common carotid artery, the left subclavian artery or continue into the descending aorta. If the particles continue into the descending aorta it poses no risk of causing ischemia however if it travels into the other arteries then it increases the possibility of the particle causing an ischemic event. The goal of this study is to determine what …

Temporal Changes To Fire Risk In Disparate Wildland Urban Interface Communities, Nicola C. Leyshon

Master's Theses

Since 1990, thirteen fires over 100,000 acres in size have burned in California seven of which were recorded to be some of the most destructive wildfires of all time (California Department of Forestry & Fire Protection 2013). To aid the development of policy that reduces the destruction caused by wildfires, it is important to evaluate how risk changes through time in communities that are expanding into fire-prone areas. The objective of this study is to discover how the likelihood of structural loss is changing in WUI as newer; more fire resilient structures replace older structures on the edges of the …

Geospatial Data Modeling To Support Energy Pipeline Integrity Management, Austin Wylie

Master's Theses

Several hundred thousand miles of energy pipelines span the whole of North America -- responsible for carrying the natural gas and liquid petroleum that power the continent's homes and economies. These pipelines, so crucial to everyday goings-on, are closely monitored by various operating companies to ensure they perform safely and smoothly.

Happenings like earthquakes, erosion, and extreme weather, however -- and human factors like vehicle traffic and construction -- all pose threats to pipeline integrity. As such, there is a tremendous need to measure and indicate useful, actionable data for each region of interest, and operators often use computer-based decision …

Early Forest Fire Detection Via Principal Component Analysis Of Spectral And Temporal Smoke Signature, David Casimir Garges

Master's Theses

The goal of this study is to develop a smoke detecting algorithm using digital image processing techniques on multi-spectral (visible & infrared) video. By utilizing principal component analysis (PCA) followed by spatial filtering of principal component images the location of smoke can be accurately identified over a period of exposure time with a given frame capture rate. This result can be further analyzed with consideration of wind factor and fire detection range to determine if a fire is present within a scene. Infrared spectral data is shown to contribute little information concerning the smoke signature. Moreover, finalized processing techniques are …

Calculating Staircase Slope From A Single Image, Nicholas Joseph Clarke

Master's Theses

Realistic modeling of a 3D environment has grown in popularity due to the increasing realm of practical applications. Whether for practical navigation purposes, entertainment value, or architectural standardization, the ability to determine the dimensions of a room is becoming more and more important. One of the trickier, but critical, features within any multistory environment is the staircase. Staircases are difficult to model because of their uneven surface and various depth aspects. Coupling this need is a variety of ways to reach this goal. Unfortunately, many such methods rely upon specialized sensory equipment, multiple calibrated cameras, or other such impractical setups. …

Nonnegative Matrix Factorization And Document Classification, Stephen Calabrese

Master's Theses

Applications of Non-negative Matrix Factorization are ubiquitous, and there are several well known algorithms available. This paper is concerned with the preprocessing of the documents and how the preprocessing effects document classification. The preprocessing discussed in this paper will run the classification on a variety of inner dimensions to see how my initialization compares to random initialization across an assortment of inner dimensions. The document classification is accomplished by using Non-negative Matrix Factorization and a Support Vector Machine. Several of the well known algorithms call for a random initialization of matrices before starting an iterative process to a locally best …

A Finite Element Analysis Of Tibial Stem Geometry For Total Knee Replacements, Aaron Isidro Bautista

Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of tibial stem geometry on stress shielding of the tibia for patients with a total knee replacement. Finite element analysis was used to study different tibial stem geometry types, as well as a vast array of different geometric sizes. Both a peg and stem type geometry were analyzed and compared in order to determine what type geometry causes the least amount of stress shielding. A static loading condition with a dynamic loading factor of three was used for the system and the stress responses were analyzed at regions of interest …

Barriers To Implementation Of A Health, Hygiene, & Sanitation Program: Chennai, India, Kelsey A. Steffen

Master's Theses

In India poor sanitation accounts for 1,600 daily deaths of children under the age of five (Dasra, 2012). The societal and environmental conditions in India and many other developing countries have continuously stood as barriers to facilitating changes in sanitation behavior. Efforts made to improve hygiene have continuously faced opposing forces including major gaps between the supply and demand of sanitation. This paper will focus on one pilot program conducted in Chennai, India over the summer of 2014. This program was designed to teach school children safe sanitation and hygienic habits by providing a guiding tool to teachers. The study …

The Smart Growth Implications Of The Los Angeles Adaptive Reuse Ordinance, Forrest F. Chamberlain

Master's Theses

The Los Angeles Adaptive Reuse Ordinance (ARO) is an incentive program that encourages building reuse through regulatory exemptions. The ARO was partially intended to reduce vehicle miles travelled by encouraging mixed commercial and residential uses in existing buildings within Downtown Los Angeles and areas poised for redevelopment (Mayor’s Office of Economic Development, 2004, pp. 22, 51). Researchers and planners claim that the ARO helped to reduce vehicle miles travelled (Bell, 2014; Los Angeles Department of City Planning, 2014d; Bullen & Love, 2009; Bernstein, 2012), but these claims are not supported by discussions of the spatial distribution of ARO projects in …

Mathematical Model Validation Of A Center Of Gravity Measuring Platform Using Experimental Tests And Fea, Michael Lashore

Master's Theses

This thesis sets out to derive an analytical model for a center of gravity (CG) measuring platform and examines its validity through experimental testing and Finite Element Modeling. The method uses a two-stage platform tilting process to first locate the planar CG coordinates and then find the third CG coordinate normal to the platform. An uncertainty model of the measuring platform was also developed, both CG and uncertainty models were implemented in the form of a MATLAB code. A load cell sizing task was also added to the code to assist the Integration Engineers at Jet Propulsion Laboratory in selecting …

Moxel Dags: Connecting Material Information To High Resolution Sparse Voxel Dags, Brent Robert Williams

Master's Theses

As time goes on, the demand for higher resolution and more visually rich images only increases. Unfortunately, creating these more realistic computer graphics is pushing our computational resources to their limits.

In realistic rendering, one of the common ways 3D objects are represented is as volumetric elements called voxels. Traditionally, voxel data structures are known for their high memory requirements. One of the standard ways these requirements are minimized is by storing the voxels in a sparse voxel octree (SVO). Very recently, a method called High Resolution Sparse Voxel DAGs was presented that can store binary voxel data orders of …

A Customer Value Assessment Process (Cvap) For Ballistic Missile Defense, Alex Hernandez

Master's Theses

A systematic customer value assessment process (CVAP) was developed to give system engineering teams the capability to qualitatively and quantitatively assess customer values. It also provides processes and techniques used to create and identify alternatives, evaluate alternatives in terms of effectiveness, cost, and risk. The ultimate goal is to provide customers (or decision makers) with objective and traceable procurement recommendations. The creation of CVAP was driven by an industry need to provide ballistic missile defense (BMD) customers with a value proposition of contractors’ BMD systems. The information that outputs from CVAP can be used to guide BMD contractors in formulating …

Clarification Of Recreational Pool Water Using Biological Additives Produced By Biowish(Tm), Reese Nathaniel Wilson

Master's Theses

Effects of commercially available bacterial products were investigated on two common recreational pool contaminants: sunscreen and cyanuric acid (CYA). Microbial products developed by BiOWiSH Technologies, Inc. were tested for enhancing mechanical filtration and water clarification in bench-scale bioreactors, with conditions mimicking those of recreational pool water. Bacterial consortia included proprietary mixes of Bacillus, Lactobacillus and Pseudomonas, and other genera of bacteria. BiOWiSH products are either fermented on a solid substrate consisting of rice bran and soy meal, or they are mixed with a soluble diluent. Twenty-nine BiOWiSH products were tested throughout forty experiments.

Experiments were carried out to determine both …

Bishop Peak Natural Reserve Conservation Plan Update, Douglas J. Bush

Master's Theses

My master's project is updating the Conservation Plan for the Bishop Peak Natural Reserve (BPNR) in San Luis Obispo, California. It is a professional project for the City of San Luis Obispo, supported by City policy that requires continued management of its open space network through management plans unique to each property. As one of the city's most visited open spaces and one of its most visible natural landmarks, the Bishop Peak Natural Reserve is in need of continued management and oversight. While much of the work in developing the plan focused on identifying issues and developing responsive policy, this …

Rest Api To Access And Manage Geospatial Pipeline Integrity Data, Alexandra Michelle Francis

Master's Theses

Today’s economy and infrastructure is dependent on raw natural resources, like crude oil and natural gases, that are optimally transported through a net- work of hundreds of thousands of miles of pipelines throughout America[28]. A damaged pipe can negatively a↵ect thousands of homes and businesses so it is vital that they are monitored and quickly repaired[1]. Ideally, pipeline operators are able to detect damages before they occur, but ensuring the in- tegrity of the vast amount of pipes is unrealistic and would take an impractical amount of time and manpower[1].

Natural disasters, like earthquakes, as well as construction are just …

An Investigation To Detect Delamination In Composite Laminated Plates Under Dynamic Loading, Jason Christopher Starnes

Master's Theses

In recent years composites have progressively been used for large-scale structures such as aircraft, ships, ground vehicles, and wind turbine blades. Traditional Nondestructive Evaluation (NDE) techniques have various limitations in assessing the performance of the large-scale composite structures. For instance, many techniques have the ability to measure either global or local properties but cannot measure both simultaneously. Nondestructive vibration detection techniques present a potential solution for evaluating both local and global large-scale composite structures, which are largely based on the fact that damage in a structure influences its dynamic characteristics such as modal parameters and Frequency Response Functions (FRF).

This …

Inlet Shape Considerations For Split-Wing Electric Distributed Propulsion, Kurt Vonderhaar Papathakis

Master's Theses

This thesis aims to uncover preliminary design relationships for an inlet of a split-wing electric distributed propulsion regional airliner. Several aspects of the inlet design were investigated, including: the overall thickness of the airfoil section with respect to the chord, inlet throat area, and lip radius. These parameters were investigated using several angles of attack and mass flow rates through the fan. Computational fluid dynamics, with a 2^nd Order turbulence model was used and validated against World War II era data from NACA, as those studies were the most pertinent wind tunnel data available. Additionally, other works by Boeing, …

High Moisture Extrusion Of Oatmeal, Brandon F. Coleman

Master's Theses

Oats are considered to be a highly nutritious breakfast food available to consumers. Heightened consumer interest in functional food products and advances in human nutrition have led to increased levels of interest in the development of new oat based products (Webster and Wood 2011). Developments in technology have led to manufacturing of instant oatmeal, making the product more convenient to consumers. Low moisture extrusion processing is one of the most widely used methods to produce ready to eat breakfast cereals; however, there has been little research carried out to determine if high moisture extrusion methods would be viable. This study …

Sweep Stability Characterization Of A Vernier-Tuned Distributed Bragg Reflector (Vt-Dbr) All-Semiconductor Tunable Swept Laser System At 1550 Nm For Sensing Applications, Roric Christian Martens Biersach

Master's Theses

The short-term jitter and longer-term wander of the frequency sweep profile of a Vernier-Tuned Distributed Bragg Reflector (VT-DBR) laser at 1550 nm used in optical coherence tomography (OCT) and other sensing applications is characterized in this work. The VT-DBR has demonstrated success in source-swept OCT (SSOCT), performing both intensity and phase-sensitive OCT.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate one of the unique aspects of the VT-DBR laser that makes it successful in OCT: the stability of the linear optical frequency sweep. A highly stable linear optical frequency sweep implies benefits for further fiber sensing applications including fiber Bragg …

Structural Micrometeoroid And Radiation Shielding For Interplanetary Spacecraft, Jared Allen Ruekberg

Master's Theses

This paper focused on two significant space forces that can affect the success of a spacecraft: the radiation and micrometeoroid environments. Both are looked at in the context of the region of space between Earth and Mars. The goal was create reference environments, to provide context to results of environmental modeling, and to provide recommendations to assist in early design decisions of interplanetary spacecraft. The radiation section of this report used NASA's OLTARIS program to generate data for analysis. The area of focus was on the radiation effects for crewed missions, therefore effective dose equivalent was the metric used to …

Toward The Systematization Of Active Authentication Research, Daniel Fleming Gerrity

Master's Theses

Authentication is the vital link between your real self and your digital self. As our digital selves become ever more powerful, the price of failing authentication grows. The most common authentication protocols are static data and employed only once at login. This allows for authentication to be spoofed just once to gain access to an entire user session. Behaviometric protocols continuously consume a user’s behavior as a token of authentication and can be applied throughout a session, thereby eliminating a fixed token to spoof. Research into these protocols as viable forms of authentication is relatively recent and is being conducted …

The Use Of Sphingomyelin To Protect Against Uv Induced Dna Damage In Human Keratinocytes, Kevin Campbell

Master's Theses

Non melanoma skin cancer (NMSC) is a serious condition caused by chronic ultraviolet (UV) exposure that leads to DNA damage in skin. UV radiation has the potential to lead to DNA damage, which triggers biochemical pathways within a cell. The result is that the cell either undergoes cell cycle arrest, giving the cell time to repair DNA damage, or apoptosis. Sunscreen is the most commonly used treatment for preventing UV induced skin damage, but it involves a number of undesirable and toxic side effects including damaging the dermis, premature aging of skin and underweight child births. This has led to …