Digital Commons Network^™

Knowledge Based Structure Modeling Of The Third Hypervariable Region Of Antibodies, Kevin Galens

Theses

Protein structure prediction has gained increased attention over the past decades in a wide range of biological disciplines. Creating an accurate visual model of a protein can aid in protein engineering; which has implications in the creation of therapeutic molecules as is the case with antibodies. The third complementarity determining region of the heavy chain of antibodies (CDR-H3) is known to show a large degree of variation in sequence and in length, and therefore has provided difficulties for structure prediction. By separating the CDR-H3 into two logical sections, the apex and base, and using a homology modeling techniques for each …

Low Temperature Dopant Activation For Applications In Thin Film Silicon Devices, Eric Woodard

Theses

One of the major areas of research for integrated electronic systems is the development of systems on glass or plastic to optimize the performance/cost tradeoff. These new substrate materials impose stringent constraints on electronic device fabrication, including limitations on chemical and thermal processes. Processes that do not use temperatures greater than 900°C have the increased flexibility for application involving new substrate materials. Silicon is a semiconductor material that can have very different conductive properties based on the levels of impurities. A conventional method of adding impurities is ion implantation. When a substrate is implanted, the ions will break up the …

3-Dimentional Visualization Of Cancer Metastasis On The Liver, Thomas Nowacki

Theses

None provided.

Multispectral Imaging And Analysis Of The Archimedes Palimpsest, D. Michael Hansen

Theses

The Archimedes Palimpsest is a manuscript that has been preserved for approximately 1,000 years. Among its pages are some of the few known sources of treatises from the Greek mathematician Archimedes. The writing has been overwritten with prayer text, called the Euchologion, and portions of the faded Archimedes text are difficult to read. This research investigates methods to detect the presence of ink in the Archimedes Palimpsest using state-of-the-art image processing techniques applied to data from X-ray fluorescence (XRF) scans.

In an effort to extract more legible text, various methods of imaging have been applied to the Archimedes manuscript. Recent …

Producing Premium Products On Synthetic Substrates Through The Application Of Offset Lithography, Nutthavee Poonbunditkul

Theses

For this research, the image quality attributes of offset printing versus screen printing methods for providing high-resolution premium products, such as plastic key chains, were investigated. The three substrates investigated were Polypropylene (PP), Polyvinyl chloride (PVC), and Polyester (PET). Optical properties, such as dot gain, solid ink density, ink trapping, tone reproduction and print contrast, were analyzed through color measurement and visual evaluation. In addition, the end-use applications were tested using adhesion tests, water resistance tests, and heat resistance tests to make certain that the final product achieve the best quality print and meets end-use requirements.

The results of this …

Connections, Adam Werth

Theses

The thesis describes a project to create a cohesive body of work relating to the themes of the connections between individuals, personal accountability, social responsibility, and social passivity. In addition to creating this body of work, the artist also created a website related to it (which provided an opportunity for feedback as well as links to social resources), and placed advertisements in public papers directing the public to the website by using provocative statements such as 'You are fat'

A Comparison Study Of Concentric Screening Versus Conventional Am Screening And Fm Screening In Offset Printing, Eugenio Carvajal

Theses

A new screening technology from Artwork Systems, Concentric screening, was evaluated against conventional AM and FM Staccato screening. The main feature of Concentric screening is to have very small concentric white circles inside AM halftone dots. Test targets were used in order to get information about different aspects of screening, such as: sensitivity to changes in ink film thickness; color gamut size, particularly for pastel colors; and detail rendering. A comparison was made between AM, FM, and Concentric screening. The results indicate that Concentric tints are more resistant to ink variation than conventional AM screening. Thus, the dot gain stability …

Marginalized Collections And Web 2.0 Technologies: Creating Lasting Legacies Through Collective Experiences, Katherine M. Fox

Theses

No abstract provided.

Trial, Chen-Ni Hsu

Theses

Not Included

Redefining The Responsibility Of Pre-Press File Management Within Graphic Design: How Printing Technology Impacts Our Design Development, Meredith A. Bielaska

Theses

Technical problems can arise when a graphic designer submits digital files to a commercial offset lithographic printer. The graphic design profession has an opportunity to strengthen the education of design students by teaching them how to recognize potential printing prroblems and address them before the students enter professional practice. The purpose of this thesis is to identify the most common design problems and printing constraints that designers encounter when they develop an item to be printed using offset lithographic printing. The graphic design content of this thesis will include design development processes that specifically focus on issues of imposition, pagination, …

Biosorption Of Priority Pollutants Of Petroleum Refinery Wastewater, Deen Adnan Sheikha

Theses

Heavy metals and organic materials pollution in the aquatic system have become a serious threat today. Zinc, phenol and naphthalene are common environmental contaminants. The fate and transport of these chemicals must be sufficiently understood to predict detrimental environmental impacts and to develop technically and economically appropriate remedial action to minimize environmental degradation. In this study, microbial biomass has emerged as an option for developing economic wastewater treatment. Dead algal biomass may passively sequester metals and organic materials by the process of biosorption from dilute solutions, where biomass functions as an ion exchanger by virtue of various reactive groups available …

A Supply Chain Collaboration Solution Using Xquery, Bharani Govindasamy

Theses

Enterprises in a collaborative supply chain share information for quick and intelligent decision making. Collaborative Planning, Forecasting and Replenishment (CPFR), a business model developed by an organization called Voluntary Inter-industry Commerce Standards, defines a set of business processes to collaborate on planning, forecasting and replenishment activities to arrive at a common order. This involves sharing sales forecast, order forecast and promotion information among business partners. The Internet has paved the way for using Web Services to share this information as XML data in real time and to make it available across enterprises. Enterprises need to access this information and integrate …

Architectural Design Elements: A Guest Impact, Kristen Maria Delgado

Theses

Architecture evolved from a need for shelter to an experience for everyone to enjoy. Hotel chains, owners, employees and other industry experts realize that the static image they present does not appeal to a younger generation. Since the markets are changing to a younger generation, hotels are racing to meet demands.

The purpose of this research was to analyze the impact that design and style have on the overall patron experience, likelihood to recommend, likelihood to return to the particular hotel, and the influence the stay had on the hotel brand. Conclusions have been formulated using several regression analyses, and …

Analysis Of Tensioner Induced Coupling In Serpentine Belt Drive Systems, Ryan Neward

Theses

Serpentine belt drive systems are widely used in automobiles due to their compactness and long life. These systems are composed of a belt, a driving pulley, driven pulleys, and a spring-loaded tensioner. The driven pulleys may include such accessories as the alternator, air conditioner, or power steering pump. Serpentine belt drives experience many different types of steady state motions and transient vibrations due to the different parameters in the system. As a result of this, it is important to create a mathematical model that allows the designer to extract information about the system such as the natural frequency and the …

Quantum And Spin-Based Tunneling Devices For Memory Systems, Stephen Sudirgo

Theses

Rapid developments in information technology, such as internet, portable computing, and wireless communication, create a huge demand for fast and reliable ways to store and process information. Thus far, this need has been paralleled with the revolution in solid-state memory technologies. Memory devices, such as SRAM, DRAM, and flash, have been widely used in most electronic products. The primary strategy to keep up the trend is miniaturization. CMOS devices have been scaled down beyond sub-45 nm, the size of only a few atomic layers. Scaling, however, will soon reach the physical limitation of the material and cease to yield the …

Support Within A Community, Lance Neirby

Theses

A description of the author's thesis project to create a sculpture installation demonstrating the significance of support within a community, using the form of Foxtail Bristle Grass as a model for a metal and wood sculpture. Includes photos of the thesis exhibition as well as other works that inspired its creation.

Rise: A Robust Image Search Engine, Debangshu Goswami

Theses

This thesis advances RISE (Robust Image Search Engine), an image database application designed to build and search an image repository. rise is built on the foundation of a CBIR (Content Based Image Retrieval) system. The basic goal of this system is to compute content similarity of images based on their color signatures. The color signature of an image is computed by systematically dividing the image into a number of small blocks and computing the average color of each block using ideas from DCT (Discrete Cosine Transform) that forms the basis for JPEG (Joint Photographic Experts Group) compression format. The average …

Anti-Individualism And Rationality, Adam J. Arico

Theses

Paul Boghossian has argued that externalist descriptions of mental content are unfit for assessments of rationality. An individual, he suggests, can comport with the principles of logic and rationality if and only if she is able to introspectively recognize the content of her thoughts and beliefs without relying on empirical evidence. Jessica Brown argues, first, that Boghossian¿s notion of rationality is unrealistic and incompatible with modern experimental data, and second, that his principles of transparency of mental content are unreasonable and, ultimately, self-defeating. In defending Boghossian¿s notion of rationality, and subsequently his transparency principles, this paper attempts to respond to …

Differences In Coverage Of The Gulf Wars: New York Times V. Wall Street Journal, Rama Ramanan

Theses

This study investigated differences in the newspaper coverage of Gulf War I (1991) and the recent U.S. Iraq War II (2003) using content analysis of The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. Results indicate that there were significant differences in the coverage of the two wars. The data show that The New York Times published significantly more war news stories and carried more photographs and visual elements than The Wall Street Journal. Other findings reveal significant differences in the timeliness of reporting a war story, location of the story in the newspaper, dateline of the story, …

A Psychophysical Investigation Of Global Illumination Algorithms Used In Augmented Reality, Timothy Hattenberger

Theses

Global illumination rendering algorithms are capable of producing images that are visually realistic. However, this typically comes at a large computational expense. The overarching goal of this research was to compare different rendering solutions in order to understand why some yield better results when applied to rendering synthetic objects into real photographs. As rendered images are ultimately viewed by human observers, it was logical to use psychophysics to investigate these differences. A psychophysical experiment was conducted judging the composite images for accuracy to the original photograph. In addition, iCAM, an image color appearance model, was used to calculate image differences …

Visual Design System For Music Education For Children, Sehwa Choi

Theses

The purpose of this thesis is to develop a simple and understandable visual system to convey complicated concepts of musical composition for 1st grade music students. The abstract ideas of major scale, melody and harmony are redefined and expressed appropriately through visual communication. Thus, the visualization of musical sound in this thesis can contribute to the development of music education for children. The graphic design problem of this thesis is an exploration to express abstract and complex ideas through simple visual solutions. This thesis will propose a method of visualization to convert abstract ideas into graphic design solutions, and show …

Hierarchical N-Body Problem On Graphics Processor Unit, Mohammad Faisal Siddiqui

Theses

Galactic simulation is an important cosmological computation, and represents a classical N-body problem suitable for implementation on vector processors. Barnes-Hut algorithm is a hierarchical N-Body method used to simulate such galactic evolution systems.

Stream processing architectures expose data locality and concurrency available in multimedia applications. On the other hand, there are numerous compute-intensive scientific or engineering applications that can potentially benefit from such computational and communication models. These applications are traditionally implemented on vector processors.

Stream architecture based graphics processor units (GPUs) present a novel computational alternative for efficiently implementing such high-performance applications. Rendering on a stream architecture sustains high …

Printing Studies With Conductive Inks And Exploration Of New Conducting Polymer Compositions, Anupama Karwa

Theses

In addition to low cost and high volume, continuous production of devices such as transistors and RFID tags, printable electronics show promise in the fabrication of a multiplicity of sensors, displays, photovoltaic arrays, smart cards, etc. Due to flexibility and insensitivity to substrates, the use of organics in printed electronics has opened up a number of new opportunities in novel applications. In the present work, the process capability of flexography and offset lithography for patterning conductive materials was determined using small scale equipment (rotary letterpress and duplicator respectively). Process parameters including: type of substrate, line widths, line gaps, print thickness, …

A 90 Db, 85 Mhz Operational Transconductance Amplifier (Ota) Using Gain Boosting Technique, Ashish Vora

Theses

Gain and speed are the two most important parameters of an amplifier. Optimizing an amplifier for both of these parameters leads to contradicting demands. Various architectures have been reported to obtain high gain from the circuits. Cascode circuits are widely used in circuit design at places where high gain and high output impedances are required. Different architectures like triple cascode topology, dynamic biasing and a positive feedback amplifier have been used to obtain high gains. These architectures have been compared in this thesis along with drawbacks and advantages of each.

Why Do Students Seek Enrollment Into A Bachelor's Degree Program In Hospitality Management?, Terrance R. Dinan

Theses

This study identifies underlying factors which influence students to enroll in a hospitality management bachelor's degree program. It is an important study for educational institutions from the standpoint of recruitment and for the purpose of assessing student aspirations. This study focuses exclusively on the question: "Why do students seek enrollment into a bachelor's degree program in hospitality management?"

New York City College of Technology, 300 Jay Street, Brooklyn, New York is the sole institution surveyed in this study.

The findings of this study indicate that students seek such enrollment because they have come to believe that hospitality industry jobs are …

Does Exposure Science Support The Concern Over Indoor Air Quality?, Kenneth Kasper

Theses

The purpose of this thesis is to examine the growing concern over indoor air quality (IAQ) and determine if such concern is warranted. The first questions that steer this effort include: Does scientific research substantiate a causal link between IAQ contaminants and human health? In addition, which indoor air contaminants appear to present the greatest health risks? These questions were answered primarily by reviewing exposure science based criteria that have been developed by federal and state agencies and then comparing these criteria to nominal concentrations that have been measured in the workplace. The second purpose of this thesis was to …

Random Vibration Response Statistics For Fatigue Analysis Of Nonlinear Structures, Karl Sweitzer

Theses

Statistical analysis methods are developed for determining fatigue time to failure for nonlinear structures when subjected to random loading. The change in the response, as structures progress from a linear regime to a large amplitude nonlinear regime, is studied in both the time and frequency domains. The analyses in the two domains are shown to compliment each other, allowing keen understanding of the physical fundamentals of the problem. Analysis of experimental random vibration data, obtained at Wright Patterson Air Force Base, is included to illustrate the challenge for a real, multi-mode, nonlinear structure. The reverse path frequency response identification method …

Fpga Implementation And Performance Comparison Of A Bayesian Face Detection System, Christopher J. Rericha

Theses

Face detection has primarily been a software-based effort. A hardware-based approach can provide significant speed-up over its software counterpart. Advances in transistor technology have made it possible to produce larger and faster FPGAs at more affordable prices. Through VHDL and synthesis tools it is possible to rapidly develop a hardware-based solution to face detection on an FPGA.

This work analyzes and compares the performance of a feature-invariant face detection method implemented in software and an FPGA. The primary components of the face detector were a Bayesian classifier used to segment the image into skin and nonskin pixels, and a direct …

The Effect Of Patient Advocacy On Cancer Patients' Fear And Anxiety Levels, Joan Clancy Vezelis

Theses

Healthcare outcomes may be adversely affected by patients' fear and anxiety associated with communication with health care providers. The present study investigated whether patient advocates can affect levels of fear and anxiety in hospitalized patients as measured by the Personal Report of Communication Apprehension scale (PRCA-24), the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), and the Child Surgery Worries questionnaire (CSW). Decreases were found on all three scales subsequent to patient interaction with a patient advocate. Implications and future research are discussed.

Nonlinear Digital Storytelling Through Multiple Perspectives., Aviraj Sehmi

Theses

There lies a big distinction between gaming and films in terms of interactivity, however the gap is being bridged with experimental pieces. The advances have been made on the gaming side with stories being incorporated into games through the usage of video clips. The web, due to its vastness of interactivity, has also begun to use video in experimental ways.

My thesis will apply the interactive principles of gaming to digital video to create a unique user experience, where the users choose various perspectives to investigate through the film. The user will have to watch most of the perspectives to …