Digital Commons Network^™

An Exploration Of The Effects Of Enhanced Compiler Error Messages For Computer Programming Novices, Brett A. Becker

Theses

Computer programming is an essential skill that all computing students must master and is increasingly important in many diverse disciplines. It is also difficult to learn. One of the many challenges novice programmers face from the start are notoriously cryptic compiler error messages. These report details on errors made by students and are essential as the primary source of information used to rectify those errors. However these difficult to understand messages are often a barrier to progress and a source of discouragement. A high number of student errors, and in particular a high frequency of repeated errors – when a …

Water Based Inkjet Material Deposition Of Donor-Acceptor Nanoparticles For Usage In Organic Photovoltaics, Anirudh Raju Penmetcha

Theses

Significant efficiency increases are being made for bulk heterojunction organic photovoltaic prototype devices with world records at 11%. However the chlorinated solvents most frequently used in prototype manufacture would cause local health and safety concerns or large scale environmental pollution upon expansion of these techniques for commercialization. Moreover, research to bridge prototype and large-scale production of these solar cells is still in its infancy. Most prototype devices are made in inert glove box environments using spin-coating. There is a need to develop a non-toxic ink and incorporate it into a material deposition system that can be used in mass production. …

Design Of Neuromemristive Systems For Visual Information Processing, Cory E. Merkel

Theses

Neuromemristive systems (NMSs) are brain-inspired, adaptive computer architectures based on emerging resistive memory technology (memristors). NMSs adopt a mixed-signal design approach with closely-coupled memory and processing, resulting in high area and energy efficiencies. Previous work suggests that NMSs could even supplant conventional architectures in niche application domains such as visual information processing. However, given the infancy of the field, there are still several obstacles impeding the transition of these systems from theory to practice. This dissertation advances the state of NMS research by addressing open design problems spanning circuit, architecture, and system levels. Novel synapse, neuron, and plasticity circuits are …

The Effects Of Thujone On The Function Of Nicotinic Acetylcholine Receptors, Ahmed Salaheldin Mustafa Ali Sultan

Theses

Thujone is a natural compound found in plants such as “wormwood” and “sage” and it’s also found in the alcoholic drink “Absinthe”. Thujone has been suggested as a neurotoxic compound and reported to modulate GABAA receptors. In this study, we investigated the pharmacology of Thujone on nicotinic receptors expressed in Xenopus oocytes using the two electrode voltage clamp method. Thujone (100μM) caused an 80% inhibition of Acetylcholine (ACh) induced currents in human α7-nAChRs expressed in frog oocytes while only 30% inhibition currents in α4β2 expressed oocytes and no effect on α3β4, α3β2 and α4β4 nAChRs. The mechanisms of Thujone effect …

A Visualization And Characterization Of Microstructures Of Cohesive Powders, Vineeth R. Patil

Theses

In this work, a framework for the determination of the particle positions in a fluorescent powder structure was created. The feasibility of imaging and quantifying sedimented particulate samples in air was demonstrated by using micron-sized poly-dispersed electrophotographic printing particles. Particle positions were determined by a Confocal Laser Scanning Microscope (CLSM) to capture a stack of cross-sectional images of fluorescent particle clusters. The resulting images were analyzed using Matlab image processing tools. The XYZ coordinates and radii for these particles (assumed spherical) were calculated in several selected sampling volumes, and the packing fractions were calculated. A three-dimensional visualization of the particle …

The Role Of Situation Awareness Metrics In The Assessment Of Indoor Orientation Assistive Technologies That Aid Blind Individuals In Unfamiliar Indoor Environments, Abdulrhman A. Alkhanifer

Theses

The importance of raising user's situation awareness has proven to be an important factor in the successful use of systems that involve mission-critical tasks. Indoor Orientation Assistive Technology (OAT) that supports blind individuals is one of the systems that needs to be oriented to support user's situation awareness. In the tasks involved in this system, blind individuals try to maintain their spatial understanding of the environment. The current evaluation methods of Orientation Assistive Technology that aids blind travelers within indoor environments rely on the performance metrics. When enhancing such systems, evaluators conduct qualitative studies to learn where to focus their …

Development Of Material Characterization Techniques Using Novel Nanoindentation Approaches On Hard And Soft Materials Used In Mems, Eyup Cinar

Theses

Investigating and modeling the mechanical properties of materials is important for many applications. The most common technique used for mechanical characterization of materials is called nanoindentation. The currently available tools utilized in order to perform nanoindentation have their limitations in terms of sensitivities in force and displacement for a broad range of material properties. When it comes to investigation of soft materials, these limitations might be more detrimental. In this dissertation work, novel nanoindentation techniques have been developed with a multi-probe scanning force microscopy (SPM) system in order to ease the major problems encountered with standard Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) …

Assessment Of Alignment Algorithms, Variant Discovery And Genotype Calling Strategies In Exome Sequencing Data, Anthony Corbett

Theses

Advances in next generation sequencing (NGS) technologies, in the past half decade, have enabled many novel genomic applications and have generated unprecedented amounts of new knowledge that is quickly changing how biomedical research is being conducted, as well as, how we view human diseases and diversity. As the methods, algorithms and software used to process NGS data are constantly being developed and improved, performing analysis and determining the validity of the results become complex. Moreover, as sequencing moves from being a research tool into a clinical diagnostic tool understanding the performance and limitations of bioinformatics pipelines and the results they …

Homology Based Motif Generation, Cameron Baker

Theses

Generating motifs from known active sites and matching those motifs to an uncharacterized protein is a classic way of determining protein function. Until now, the generation of motifs has been based purely on enzymatic function. This approach does not account for situations where highly different active sites can arrive at the same function by processes like convergent evolution. As such, a secondary metric on which to base the generation of motifs is necessary. This metric exists in the form of UniProt designation for homologous proteins on a global scale or PFam for designation of homologous proteins at the active site …

Expanding Dimensionality In Cinema Color: Impacting Observer Metamerism Through Multiprimary Display, David L. Long

Theses

Television and cinema display are both trending towards greater ranges and saturation of reproduced colors made possible by near-monochromatic RGB illumination technologies. Through current broadcast and digital cinema standards work, system designs employing laser light sources, narrow-band LED, quantum dots and others are being actively endorsed in promotion of Wide Color Gamut (WCG). Despite artistic benefits brought to creative content producers, spectrally selective excitations of naturally different human color response functions exacerbate variability of observer experience. An exaggerated variation in color-sensing is explicitly counter to the exhaustive controls and calibrations employed in modern motion picture pipelines. Further, singular standard observer …

Evaluation Of Reproductive Strategies In Captive California Yellowtail (Seriola Dorsalis) Using Genetic Parentage Analyses, Elizabeth K. Smith, Mark Drawbridge Ms, John Hyde Phd, Geoffrey Morse Phd

Theses

A good understanding of spawning dynamics of species in aquaculture is vital in order to maximize egg production and quality as well as efficient allocation of food and space resources. The breeding program of California yellowtail (CYT; Seriola dorsalis previously Seriola lalandi) at Hubbs-SeaWorld Research Institute (HSWRI) is set up such that up to 30 wild caught brood fish can broadcast spawn in a group setting, just as CYT reproduce in the wild. The population of brood fish were originally caught offshore from Southern California, and are maintained under ambient sea water and natural lighting conditions. The spawning season …

Modeling And Analysis Of Or Nurse Scheduling Using Mathematical Programming And Simulation, Clayton Tontarski

Theses

Nurse scheduling is a complex problem. The act of assigning each nurse to a specific shift for each day of a scheduling horizon, while ensuring to fulfill the demand of the operating rooms (ORs) is very time consuming. Current methods used in practice often develop solutions that are suboptimal, resulting in low nurse utilization, low nurse satisfaction, patient delays, or overtime pay for nurses. In this paper we propose an approach that utilizes simulation, simulation-based optimization, and mathematical programming as tools for solving complex nurse scheduling problems. We discuss how the simulation-based optimization generates multiple alternative shift plans, defined as …

Segmentation And Classification Of Remotely Sensed Images: Object-Based Image Analysis, Abdul Haleem Syed

Theses

Land-use-and-land-cover (LULC) mapping is crucial in precision agriculture, environmental monitoring, disaster response, and military applications. The demand for improved and more accurate LULC maps has led to the emergence of a key methodology known as Geographic Object-Based Image Analysis (GEOBIA). The core idea of the GEOBIA for an object-based classification system (OBC) is to change the unit of analysis from single-pixels to groups-of-pixels called `objects' through segmentation. While this new paradigm solved problems and improved global accuracy, it also raised new challenges such as the loss of accuracy in categories that are less abundant, but potentially important. Although this trade-off …

Insense: A Variation And Fault Tolerant Architecture For Nanoscale Devices, John A. Frye

Theses

Transistor technology scaling has been the driving force in improving the size, speed, and power consumption of digital systems. As devices approach atomic size, however, their reliability and performance are increasingly compromised due to reduced noise margins, difficulties in fabrication, and emergent nano-scale phenomena. Scaled CMOS devices, in particular, suffer from process variations such as random dopant fluctuation (RDF) and line edge roughness (LER), transistor degradation mechanisms such as negative-bias temperature instability (NBTI) and hot-carrier injection (HCI), and increased sensitivity to single event upsets (SEUs). Consequently, future devices may exhibit reduced performance, diminished lifetimes, and poor reliability.

This research proposes …

A Secure Neuromemristive Primitive To Mitigate Correlation Power Analysis On Sha-3 Hash Function, James B. Thesing

Theses

Passing messages to soldiers on the battle field, conducting online banking, and downloading files on the internet are very different applications that all share one thing in common, concerns over security of the data being processed. Data security depends on the cryptographic systems that take into account both the algorithmic weakness and the weaknesses of the hardware devices they are implemented on. The current dominant hardware design medium is complementary metal-oxide-semi-conductor (CMOS). CMOS has been shown to leak more power as the technology node size decreases. The leaked power has a strong correlation with the bits being manipulated inside a …

Automatic Localization Of Epileptic Spikes In Eegs Of Children With Infantile Spasms, Supachan Traitruengsakul

Theses

Infantile Spasms (ISS) characterized by electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings exhibiting hypsarrythmia (HYPS) are a severe form of epilepsy. Many clinicians have been trying to improve ISS outcomes; however, quantification of discharges from hypsarrythmic EEG readings remains challenging.

This thesis describes the development of a novel method that assists clinicians to successfully localize the epileptic discharges associated with ISS in HYPS. The approach includes: construct the time-frequency domain (TFD) of the EEG recording using matching pursuit TFD (MP-TFD), decompose the TFD matrix into two submatrices using nonnegative matrix factorizations (NMF), and employ the decomposed vectors to locate the spikes.

The proposed method …

Scanner: Sequence Clustering Of Resource Access To Find Nearest Neighbors, Neil Wong Hon Chan

Theses

The Android operating system currently holds 83% of the smartphone market with more than three million applications available on the leading applications (apps) stores.

These apps require a set of permissions on installation and the user has to trust that they behave as expected. This can represent a risk to the user's sensitive information and hence a critical question is how can we track these apps and understand how they are behaving. The current methods to characterize the behavior of applications focus on two types: 1) static analysis, extracting information from the .dex files or the manifest.xml, and 2) dynamic …

The Role Of Electronsensory Signals On The Locomotor Performance Of The Weakly Electric Fish Apteronotus Albifrons, Oswaldo Gil-Guevara

Theses

Animal locomotion performance responds to different ecological factors that shape relevant aspects of behavior. Conspecific signals is one of these factors and operates in a wide range of contexts. In schooling fish, coordinated movement is based on visual or mechanical cues and signals. In contrast, most gymnotiforms and mormyriforms are nocturnal or live in dark waters and use electric signals for social communication. However, the effect of conspecific electric signals on locomotion and group movement is largely unknown.

Apteronotus albifrons is a well-known model in neuroethological studies of signal processing and locomotion control that relies mostly on visual inputs but …

Effect Of Endplate On The Blast Wave Profile In A Compressed Gas Shock Tube, Sudeepto Kahali

Theses

Blast related brain injuries are commonly encountered in the recent wars of Iraq and Afghanistan increased use of improvised explosive devices (IEDs). An estimated 20% of veterans returning from these operations have suffered traumatic brain injuries (TBI). The mechanisms and long-term effects of the injury are not fully understood, and extensive research effort is being focused toward identifying the mechanisms of primary blast injury. When a pure shock-blast wave encounters a subject, in the absence of shrapnel, casing or gaseous products, the loading is termed as primary blast loading, and its effects can be studied using shock tubes.

The wave …

Use Of Experts' Gaze By Novice Usability Practitioners To Perform A Better Heuristic Evaluation, Sree Anirudh J. Bhandaram

Theses

Proficiency in conducting heuristic evaluations does not come easily; it is an acquired skill that takes years to master. It is often difficult to convey an effective evaluation strategy through a verbal approach. While communicating verbally, people may prompt to where they focus their attention, but this is often difficult to convey. Through an eye tracking study, the relationship between an expert’s gaze while performing a task and a novice’s learning to better perform a heuristic evaluation will be explored. Novices concentrate on basic, but irrelevant parts of a task while processing complex stimuli whereas experts process stimuli quicker while …

Investigation And Characterization Of Conductive Deap Polymer Materials With Nickel Nanocomposites, Seaver Wrisley

Theses

Dielectric ElectroActive Polymers, or DEAPs, are devices with coupled electrical and mechanical responses that resemble stretchable parallel plate capacitors, that can act as actuators, sensors, or electrical generators. Currently, the electrode layers on the top and bottom are generally conductive carbon grease, which is dirty and also causes curing issues for certain polymers. This thesis explores several polymers and conductive fillers to identify a conductive nanocomposite material, to replace the grease electrode with a solid material and eliminate issues associated with grease electrodes. It then characterizes the mechanical and electric properties and how they change during cyclic loading, while augmenting …

(Re)Connecting With Listeners: How Radio Stations Are Reaching Beyond The Dial (And Their Competitors) To Connect With Their Audience, Alyxandra Sherwood

Theses

Radio has a history of adapting to new technologies to spread its signal farther and more efficiently to a larger audience. With the emergence of social media, the audience has begun to use non-traditional media channels to reach back and out to each other, thus by-passing traditional media outlets such as radio. Prior studies examined how the audience has shifted its daily routine to incorporate new technology. The present study sought to determine to what extent radio stations in New York State have adapted to use non-traditional media channels, how often they update those channels, and if revenue type had …

A Cognitive Theory-Based Approach For The Evaluation And Enhancement Of Internet Security Awareness Among Children Aged 3-12 Years, Asma Eidhah M. Aloufi

Theses

In the age of technology, the Internet has spread widely and used for multiple purposes by users of all ages, especially children who start using it frequently to play in their spare time. With the use of the Internet, children must have a sufficient security awareness to avoid security risks found online. This study takes us through the journey of evaluating and enhancing the level of the Internet security awareness among a group of Saudi children aged 3-12 years. The developed evaluation survey shows that there is some awareness among the Saudi Children; however, they still need more concrete ways …

A Guidance Template For Attack Sequence Specification In Cyber Attack Simulation, Derek Miles Kreider

Theses

Over the past decade the cost and frequency of cybercrime has skyrocketed and is still increasing year over year. Major targets of cyber attacks are financial organizations, energy and utility companies, governmental agencies, and technology companies. However, almost all businesses are at risk. The increasing threat and cost of cyber crime is caused by many factors, including: the increasing reliance on cyber networks, constantly evolving exploitation and cyber attack methods, and insufficient development of defensive mechanisms to predict and prevent cyber attackers. Promising research in the proactive defense against cyber attacks exists in the field of cyber situational awareness (Cyber …

Comparing Uncivil Discourse With A Conversational Intelligent Agent In Public And Private Online Settings, Mark Marcello

Theses

According to a recent study by the Pew Research Center, 60% of participants of a survey said they have witnessed online abuse, and 66% of that abuse occurred via social media. This study looks at online communication, and tests if anonymity increases the amount of abuse that occurs during online communication. A quasi-experiment was developed to look for uncivil discourse using a conversational intelligent agent to create a controlled, repeatable conversational environment. The interactions with the agent occur in two settings: one in public at a kiosk, and a second in private. The researcher hypothesized that the interactions that occur …

Spectrally Based Material Color Equivalency: Modeling And Manipulation, Maxim W. Derhak

Theses

A spectrally based normalization methodology (Wpt normalization) for linearly transforming cone excitations or sensor values (sensor excitations) to a representation that preserves the perceptive concepts of lightness, chroma and hue is proposed resulting in a color space with the axes labeled W , p, t. Wpt (pronounced “Waypoint") has been demonstrated to be an effective material color equivalency space that provides the basis for defining Material Adjustment Transforms that predict the changes in sensor excitations of material spectral reflectance colors due to variations in observer or illuminant. This is contrasted with Chromatic Adaptation Transforms that predict color appearance as defined …

Individual Colorimetric Observers For Personalized Color Imaging, Yuta Asano

Theses

Colors are typically described by three values such as RGB, XYZ, and HSV. This is rooted to the fact that humans possess three types of photoreceptors under photopic conditions, and human color vision can be characterized by a set of three color matching functions (CMFs). CMFs integrate spectra to produce three colorimetric values that are related to visual responses. In reality, large variations in CMFs exist among color-normal populations. Thus, a pair of two spectrally different stimuli might be a match for one person but a mismatch for another person, also known as observer metamerism.

Observer metamerism is a serious …

Signature Simulation And Characterization Of Mixed Solids In The Visible And Thermal Regimes, Tyler D. Carson

Theses

Solid target signatures vary due to geometry, chemical composition and scene radiometry. Although radiative transfer models and function-fit physical models may describe certain targets in limited depth, the ability to incorporate all three of these signature variables is difficult. This work describes a method to simulate the transient signatures of mixed solids and soils by first considering scene geometry that was synthetically created using 3-d physics engines. Through the assignment of spectral data from the Nonconventional Exploitation Factors Data System (NEFDS) and other libraries, synthetic scenes are represented as a chemical mixture of particles. Finally, first principles radiometry is modeled …

Doping Profile Measurements In Silicon Using Terahertz Domain Spectroscopy (Thz-Tds) Via Electrochemical Anodic Oxidation, Gaurav Tulsyan

Theses

Doping profiles are engineered to manipulate device properties and to determine electrical performances of microelectronic devices frequently. To support engineering studies afterward, essential information is usually required from physically characterized doping profiles.

Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (SIMS), Spreading Resistance Profiling (SRP) and Electrochemical Capacitance Voltage (ECV) profiling are standard techniques for now to map profile. SIMS yields a chemical doping profile via ion sputtering process and owns a better resolution, whereas ECV and SRP produce an electrical doping profile detecting free carriers in microelectronic devices. The major difference between electrical and chemical doping profiles is at heavily doped regions greater …

Reliable Low-Latency And Low-Complexity Viterbi Architectures Benchmarked On Asic And Fpga, Vineeta Pannalal Singh

Theses

The Viterbi algorithm is commonly applied in a number of sensitive usage models including decoding convolutional codes used in communications such as satellite communication, cellular relay, and wireless local area networks. Moreover, the algorithm has been applied to automatic speech recognition and storage devices. In this thesis, efficient error detection schemes for architectures based on low-latency, low-complexity Viterbi decoders are presented. The merit of the proposed schemes is that reliability requirements, overhead tolerance, and performance degradation limits are embedded in the structures and can be adapted accordingly. We also present three variants of recomputing with encoded operands and its modifications …