Digital Commons Network^™

Selection Of Best Sites For Aquifer Storage And Recovery In The Eastern District Of Abu Dhabi Emirate, United Arab Emirates, Karim Ali Mahfouz Abdou Khalil

Theses

The Emirate of Abu Dhabi relied on groundwater as the main source of fresh water for several decades in the past. This resulted in the deterioration of the non-renewable groundwater aquifers; and thus, desalination plants have become the major source of freshwater supply in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Diminishing natural groundwater is a serious threat to freshwater security in arid regions. Because UAE has the world’s highest per capita water consumption rate, more than 70 desalination plants have been built in the last two decades. A major concern, therefore, is the vulnerability of these desalination plants to pollution and …

Design And Verification Of An Rsa Encryption Core, Gowtham Ramakrishnan

Theses

Cryptoprocessors are becoming a standard to make the data-usage more discrete. A wellknown elector-mechanical cipher machine called the “enigma machine” was used in early 20th century to encrypt all confidential military and diplomatic information. With the advent of microprocessors in late 20th century the world of cryptography revolutionized. A cryptosystem is system on chip which contains cryptography algorithms used for encryption and decryption of data. These cryptoprocessors are used in ATM’s and highly portable communication systems. Encryption and decryption are the fundamental processes behind any cryptosystem. There are many encryption and decryption algorithms available; one such algorithm is known as …

The Baadasssss And The Avant-Garde: The Radical Aesthetics And Politics Of Melvin Van Peebles, Samuel Jay Smucker

Theses

Melvin Van Peebles is best known for Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song (1971) and that film’s role in inspiring the Blaxploitation cycle of films of the early 1970s. However, it was in France, where he had emigrated like other black creatives in the 1960s, that Van Peebles became a filmmaker. Drawing on biographical research and a close reading of his films, I connect Van Peebles to the institutions and aesthetics of the French New Wave. Van Peebles radicalizes New Wave techniques by employing them to illuminate issues of racism. I generate a new reading of Sweetback which connects the experimental aesthetics …

Real-Time Facial Emotion Recognition Using Fast R-Cnn, Salem Bin Saqer Almarri

Theses

In computer vision and image processing, object detection algorithms are used to detect semantic objects of certain classes of images and videos. Object detector algorithms use deep learning networks to classify detected regions. Unprecedented advancements in Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) have led to new possibilities and implementations for object detectors. An object detector which uses a deep learning algorithm detect objects through proposed regions, and then classifies the region using a CNN. Object detectors are computationally efficient unlike a typical CNN which is computationally complex and expensive. Object detectors are widely used for face detection, recognition, and object tracking. In …

Structure Preserving Regularizer For Neural Style Transfer, Krushal Kyada

Theses

The aim of the project is to generate an image in the style of the image by a well-known artist. The experiment will use artificial neural networks to transfer the style of one image onto another. In Computer Vision context: capturing the content invariant that is the style of an image and applying it on the content of another image.

Initially captures the tensors that we need from the content and style image and then we pass the input image which will initially be an image with noise and our algorithm will try to minimize the loss between the input …

Acquisition Of Hockey Goalies Kinematic Data Using Motion Capture Systems, Tzu-Ting Hsu

Theses

Hockey goalies all over the world have adopted the butterfly style of goaltending due to the fast pace of the game. However, the style of play has brought the potential for injuries to goalies. In this study, a motion capture system was used to analyze the butterfly motion performed by a human subject to quantify the kinematics and kinetics associated with the motion. Further analysis was done with the motion capture data to obtain the joint angles of the hip and the knee joints and the forces in the joints associated with the butterfly motions. Through the experiments, the kinematics …

Verification Of Sha-256 And Md5 Hash Functions Using Uvm, Dinesh Anand Bashkaran

Theses

Data integrity assurance and data origin authentication are important security aspects in commerce, financial transfer, banking, software, email, data storage, etc. Cryptographic hash functions specified by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) provides secure algorithms for data security. Hash functions are designed to digest the data and produce a hash message; a hash is a one-way function which is highly secured and difficult to invert. In this paper, two such hash algorithms are verified using the Universal Verification Methodology (UVM). UVM is IEEE 1800 standard developed to assist in the verification of digital designs; it reduces the hurdle …

Design Of A Flexible Schoenhage-Strassen Fft Polynomial Multiplier With High-Level Synthesis, Kevin Millar

Theses

Homomorphic Encryption (HE) is a promising field because it allows for encrypted data to be sent to and operated on by untrusted parties without the risk of privacy compromise. The benefits and applications of HE are far reaching, especially in regard to cloud computing. However, current HE solutions require resource intensive arithmetic operations such as high precision, high degree polynomial multiplication resulting in a minimum computational complexity of O(n log(n)) on standard CPUs though application of the Fast Fourier Transform (FFT). These operations result in poor overall performance for HE schemes in software and would benefit greatly from hardware acceleration. …

A Mechanized Theory Of Communication Analysis In Cml, Thomas Logan

Theses

For this master's thesis, I have developed a formal semantics of a language with concurrent processes (or threads), an initial formal analysis, along with related theorems and formal proofs. The language under analysis is a very simplified version of Concurrent ML. The formal analysis recasts an analysis with informal proofs developed by Reppy and Xiao. It categorizes communication described by programs into simple topologies. One description of topologies is static; that is, it describes all static topologies of a program in a finite number of steps. Another description is dynamic; that is, it describes topologies in terms of running a …

Exploring Emirati Ninth Grade Students’ Use Of Edmodo In Learning English: A Mixed-Method Study, Amna Hamad Al Nuami

Theses

This mixed-method study is aimed at exploring the use of EDMODO by Emirati ninth grade female students (n = 97) who are studying English as a second language. In the first phase of the study, quantitative data were collected by using a questionnaire. Additionally, from the original pool, a subset of students (n = 11) were interviewed with regards to EDMODO usage in the classroom. The findings from this study revealed that ninth-grade students found EDMODO to be first and foremost an interesting and joyful learning experience; Second, they also reported it is an efficient platform for …

A Comparative Assessment Of The Impact Of Various Norms On Wasserstein Generative Adversarial Networks, Chandini Ramesh

Theses

Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) provide a fascinating new paradigm in machine learning and artificial intelligence, especially in the context of unsupervised learning. GANs are quickly becoming a state of the art tool, used in various applications such as image generation, image super resolutions, text generation, text to image synthesis to name a few. However, GANs potential is restricted due to the various training difficulties. To overcome the training difficulties of GANs, the use of a more powerful measure of dissimilarity via the use of the Wasserstein distance was proposed. Thereby giving birth to the GAN extension known as Wasserstein Generative …

Nmr Studies Of Translational And Rotational Diffusion Of A Phase Separating Eye Lens Protein: Bovine Γb-Crystallin, Aaron Thomas Fadden

Theses

Cataracts are one of the leading causes of blindness in the world. Cataracts can occur when proteins (known as “crystallins”) in the cytoplasm of the eye lens phase separate or associate, creating local fluctuations in the refractive index of the lens. Bovine γB-crystallin is analogous (in sequence, structure, and function) to the human γD-crystallin and can be isotopically labeled during growth with 13C and 15N when expressed in Escherichia coli. In this work, the two most important Brownian motions, rotational and translational diffusion, were measured under various temperatures and concentrations in an effort to better understand the intermolecular interactions and …

Efficient Distribution Regression, Nicholas Wilkins

Theses

In this thesis we devise a method for performing distribution regression utilizing an extension of mixture density networks. This method will be benchmarked against other state-of-the-art methods (utilizing negative log loss) and distribution-agnostic models of similar complexity. We demonstrate that our proposed method performs at least as well as the state-of-the-art methods in distribution regression. Additionally, we show that adding distribution predictive capabilities does not significantly decrease performance in models. We illustrate how one can utilize this methodology to regress to confidence interval predictions. Finally, we demonstrate a variety of novel and interesting applications of our framework.

Global Congestion And Fault Aware Wireless Interconnection Framework For Multicore Systems, Sajeed Mohammad Shahriat

Theses

Multicore processors are getting more common in the implementation of all type of computing demands, starting from personal computers to the large server farms for high computational demanding applications. The network-on-chip provides a better alternative to the traditional bus based communication infrastructure for this multicore system. Conventional wire-based NoC interconnect faces constraints due to their long multi-hop latency and high power consumption. Furthermore high traffic generating applications sometimes creates congestion in such system further degrading the systems performance. In this thesis work, a novel two-state congestion aware wireless interconnection framework for network chip is presented. This WiNoC system was designed …

Multiscale Fluid-Structure Interaction Models Development And Applications To The 3d Elements Of A Human Cardiovascular System, Yogesh Karnam

Theses

Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are the number one cause of death of humans in the United States and worldwide. Accurate, non-invasive, and cheaper diagnosis methods have always been on demand as cardiovascular monitoring increase in prevalence. The primary causes of the various forms of these CVDs are atherosclerosis and aneurysms in the blood vessels. Current noninvasive methods (i.e., statistical/medical) permit fairly accurate detection of the disease once clinical symptoms are suggestive of the existence of hemodynamic disorders. Therefore, the recent surge of hemodynamics models facilitated the prediction of cardiovascular conditions.

The hemodynamic modeling of a human circulatory system involves varying levels …

Lightweight Information Security Methods For Indoor Wireless Body Area Networks: From Channel Modeling To Secret Key Extraction, Ruslan Dautov

Theses

A group of wirelessly communicating sensors that are placed inside, on or around a human body constitute a Wireless Body Area Network (WBAN). Continuous monitoring of vital signs through WBANs have a potential to revolutionize current health care services by reducing the cost, improving accessibility, and facilitating medical diagnosis. However, sensitive nature of personal health data requires WBANs to integrate appropriate security methods and practices. As limited hardware resources make conventional security measures inadequate in a WBAN context, this work is focused on alternative techniques based on Wireless Physical Layer Security (WPLS). More specifically, we introduce a symbiosis of WPLS …

Simulation-Based Inference On Mixture Experiments, Tejasv Bedi

Theses

Mixture Experiments provide a foundation to optimize the predicted response basedon blends of different components . Parody and Edwards (2006) gave a method of inference on the expected response of a 2nd-order rotatable design, utilizing a simulation-based critical point to give substantially sharper intervals when compared to the simultaneous confidence intervals provided by Sa and Edwards (1993). Here, we begin with discussing the theory of mixture experiments and pseudocomponents. Then we move on to review the literature of simulation-based methods forgenerating critical points and visualization techniques of general response surface designs. Next, we develop the simulation-based technique for a {q, …

Transferring Generalized Knowledge From Physics-Based Simulation To Clinical Domain, Mohammed Abdullatif Alawad

Theses

A primary factor for the success of machine learning is the quality of labeled training data. However, in many fields, labeled data can be costly, difficult, or even impossible to acquire. In comparison, computer simulation data can now be generated at a much higher abundance with a much lower cost.

These simulation data could potentially solve the problem of data deficiency in many machine learning tasks. Nevertheless, due to model assumptions, simplifications and possible errors, there is always a discrepancy between simulated and real data. This discrepancy needs to be addressed when transferring the knowledge from simulation to real data. …

Development Of A Two Dimensional Stochastic Methodology And A Computer Model To Assess Response To The Nonlinear Seismic Wave Propagation, Sudhanshu Sengaonkar

Theses

Seismic wave propagation in spatially variable soil continuum can be described by partial differential equations (PDE) with stochastic coefficients. Typical method of analysis in this area is a spectral analysis approach, where time series is presented by a Fourier expansion or a Fourier integral transform. This approach has a limited capability being applicable to the linear problems only.

The novelty of presented method is that it can handle any nonlinear elastic - plastic stochastic constitutive model. The output of the project is the 2D seismic random wave propagation model accounting for the spatial variability of soil properties, described by the …

A Model-Free Control Algorithm Based On The Sliding Mode Control Method With Applications To Unmanned Aircraft Systems, Adarsh Raj Kadungoth Sreeraj

Theses

Control methods require the use of a system model for the design and tuning of the controllers in meeting and/or exceeding the control system performance objectives. However, system models contain errors and uncertainties that also may be complex to develop and to generalize for a large class of systems such as those for unmanned aircraft systems. In particular, the sliding control method is a superior robust nonlinear control approach due to the direct handling of nonlinearities and uncertainties that can be used in tracking problems for unmanned aircraft system. However, the derivation of the sliding mode control law is tedious …

Eastern State Penitentiary: A Digital Restoration, Nicholas Gregory Golden

Theses

A model of prison architecture which has been replicated in modern prisons and schools throughout the world, Eastern State Penitentiary was built as the first prison to induce reformation upon its inmates. While kept in solitary confinement inside of generously proportioned cells with barrel vaulted ceilings lit by skylights, inmates were thought to see the light of God and be penitent of their crimes. Today, the interior of the structure is kept in ruin without funding to restore a major cell-block to its former prestige. The cells of the prison today have become dilapidated since the prison closed in 1970 …

Starved Lubrication Using Ionic Liquid As An Additive To Biodegradable Oil In Titanium-Ceramic Contact, Sameer Magar

Theses

Friction leads to energy loss in any system that has two bodies in contact and relative motion with each other. Advancements in lubricants and the lubrication process have helped to reduce friction and in return reduced energy losses owing to friction. But, however, lubricant starvation is still a reality and can happen in applications like piston-ring and cylinder liner contact, and machining etc. It can cause equipment damage leading to unexpected downtime. Ionic liquids, in the recent years have shown a great potential in terms of friction and wear reduction. Using ionic liquids as additives helps reduce the cost of …

Bubble Interactions At Multi-Fluid Interfaces, Travis S. Emery

Theses

Numerous industrial applications and environmental phenomena are centered around bubble interactions at multi-fluid interfaces. These applications range from metallurgical processing to direct contact evaporation and solid shell formation. Environmental phenomena, such as bubble collisions with the sea surface microlayer and the collision of liquid encapsulated bubbles, were also considered as motivators for this work. Although the associated flow dynamics are complex, they play a vital role in governing the related application outcome, be it in terms of mass or heat transfer efficiency, bubble shell production rate, chemical reaction rate, etc. For this reason, a fundamental understanding of the fluid dynamics …

Machine Learning For Real-Time Data-Driven Security Practices, Shane Coleman

Theses

The risk of cyber-attacks exploiting vulnerable organisations has increased significantly over the past several years. Cyber-attacks can be described as any type of aggressive strategy which targets computer information systems, computer networks, personal computer systems or other organisational infrastructures which may originate internally or externally. These attacks may combine to exploit a vulnerability breach within a system’s protection strategy which has the potential for loss, damage or destruction of assets. Consequently, every vulnerability has an accompanying risk which is defined as the “intersection of assets, threats, and vulnerabilities”.

This research project uses various types of recommender system techniques, employed for …

Enhanced Mppt Controllers For Smart Grid Applications, Mohamed Khallaf

Theses

Over the past years, the energy demand has been steadily growing and so methods of how to cope with this staggering increase are being researched and utilized. One method of injecting more energy to the grid is renewable energy, which has become in recent years an integral part of any country’s power generation plan. Thus, it is a necessity to enhance renewable energy resources and maximize their grid utilization, so that these resources can step up and reduce the over dependency of global energy production on depleting energy resources.

This thesis focuses on solar power and effective means to enhance …

When Linguistics And Heritage Intersect: Language Preservation And Revitalization In Cultural Institutions, Katharine Maclaren

Theses

This work explores the ways in which cultural institutions, namely museums, libraries, and archives, can help save dying languages. It first introduces language preservation and revitalization as a field and then evaluates current efforts, including those outside the museum sphere. The question guiding this research is: Given the missions of cultural institutions, their collections, and their relationships with surrounding communities, how can these institutions successfully contribute to the preservation and revitalization of endangered languages in the long-term, and how might success be evaluated? The preservation of Scottish Gaelic will be considered as a specific case study by looking at several …

Synthesis And Biological Applications Of Some Novel Urea And Thiourea-Quinoline Derivatives, Aysha Mohammed Alkaabi

Theses

Extensive literature survey reveals that 8-Hydroxyquinoline (8-HQ), urea, thiourea and piperazine exhibit wide biological activity profile such as anticancer, anti-Alzheimer, anti-viral, antibacterial and antifungal activity. Novel urea and thiourea-quinoline derivatives connected by piperazine moiety have been synthesized and purified using appropriate techniques (extraction, crystallization and column chromatography) followed by characterization using IR spectroscopy and NMR spectroscopy (both ¹H and ¹³C).

Biological activity, metal chelation properties and the photo-physical properties were studied for these novel compounds. Anti-bacterial study shows moderate activity for most of the compounds against P.aereginosa, S.aureus and Enterococcus at concentration 250 μM. Antifungal study showed …

Synthesis And Biological Applications Of Some Novel Urea And Thiourea-Benzimidazole Derivatives, Lamia Ali Siddig

Theses

The objective of this research is the synthesis and characterization of novel urea and thiourea-benzimidazole derivatives and to test their biological activities. The 17 novel compounds (57a-j), (58a-d), 62, 63, and 65 have been synthesized, purified by different techniques such as extraction and column chromatography, and then characterized by using suitable spectroscopic techniques including ^¹H-NMR, ¹³C-NMR, fluorescence, and IR spectroscopy techniques.

The biological activity of these compounds has been studied. The antibacterial activity was evaluated at different concentrations (μg/ ml) against 6 types of bacteria (Esherichia coli, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Salmonella enterica, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Staphylococcus aureus …

The Ecological Impacts Of Climate Change In Hot Regions – Are Hawksbill Turtles Living Above Their Optimum Temperature In The Uae?, Obaid Ali Alshamsi

Theses

It is getting warmer throughout the world but it is not getting warmer by the same amount in all regions, leading to speculations that the biggest impact will be the impact on species living in the hot regions is widely assumed to be slight in comparison to the temperate and higher latitude regions. Temperature changes in hot regions are smaller, but it may be that the species in those regions have reached their optimum temperatures. In which case the effects of even a small temperature increase could be steeply negative. To test this thoroughly in terms of demographic parameters I …

Synthesizing Cyber Intrusion Alerts Using Generative Adversarial Networks, Christopher R. Sweet

Theses

Cyber attacks infiltrating enterprise computer networks continue to grow in number, severity, and complexity as our reliance on such networks grows. Despite this, proactive cyber security remains an open challenge as cyber alert data is often not available for study.

Furthermore, the data that is available is stochastically distributed, imbalanced, lacks homogeneity, and relies on complex interactions with latent aspects of the network structure. Currently, there is no commonly accepted way to model and generate synthetic alert data for further study; there are also no metrics to quantify the fidelity of synthetically generated alerts or identify critical attributes within the …