Digital Commons Network^™

Multicodes For Improved Range Resolution In Radar, Rhiya Vitto

Theses

Third generation (3G) wireless systems are required to support a variety of communication services like voice, image, motion picture transmission, etc, each of which requires different transmission rates. Multi-code modulation has been introduced therefore as a means of supporting multi-rate services and operating in multi-cell environments [8, 9, 10]. This multi-rate multi-function capability may be used in Radar related applications, too. For example, a single transmitted waveform consisting of two orthogonal codes can be used to simultaneously track a target and obtain high range resolution. Tracking requires low bandwidth and high resolution needs a high bandwidth signal. Orthogonal codes like …

Implementing Standards And Guidelines For C-Print In The Secondary Education Of Deaf Students, Jason Franklin

Theses

This curriculum project was created in hopes of developing a set of guidelines that will strengthen the use of C-print and speech to text services at the K-12 level. The (1998) National Task force on Educational Interpreting released a report that outlined the job description, roles and responsibilities of all Educational Interpreters. In contract, C-print and speech to text services do not yet have a clear consensus or mandate on the roles and responsibilities involved in this service. This project attempts to address the strengths and weaknesses of implementing C-print in public schools. It also creates materials to better prepare …

Enhancing End-To-End Quality Of Service Provisioning In Wireless Ad Hoc Networks Using Service Vectors, Didem Gozupek

Theses

A cross-layer architecture that achieves significant power savings, while enhancing the end-to-end QoS provisioning and granularity in wireless ad hoc networks is proposed in this thesis. Recently, a new concept called service vector has been introduced, which enables an end host to choose different service classes along its data path. This scheme enhances the user benefits from the network services and network resource utilization, while maintaining the simplicity and scalability of the current Differentiated Services (DiffServ) network architecture. This thesis explores the application of this concept on wireless ad hoc networks and provides a cross-layer architecture based on the combination …

Combined Effects Of Prozac And Hypothalmic Mediated Response On Masseter Muscle Activity In The Cat, Chika P. Nwaorgu

Theses

The present study tested the hypothesis that infusion of Prozac would serve to suppress defensive rage elicited from the medial hypothalamus of the cat. Cats are known to exhibit certain kind of behavior, known as the "defensive rage response" such as unsheathing of the claws, retraction of the ear and vocalization (hissing).

Three adult cats (2 males and 1 female) weighing (2.8 - 3.4 kg) were utilized during the experiments. Cannula-electrodes were implanted into the medial hypothalamus for elicitation of defensive rage behavior. EMG activity was recorded with a bipolar electrode attached to the masseter muscle to establish baseline before …

A Gait Generation Mechanism For Leg Rehabilitation Therapy, Yazan Ahmad Manna

Theses

While most take their ability to walk for granted, some are unable to walk secondary to any number of pathologies, such as traumatic brain injury (TBI), spinal cord injury (SCI), cerebrovascular accidents (CVA), cerebral palsy (CP), multiple sclerosis (MS), Parkinson's disease, as well as various orthopedic conditions. Decreased activity has been shown to be associated with rapidly deconditioning and other co-morbidities. Rehabilitation techniques that afford patients the ability to begin reconditioning through walking sooner may ultimately enhance their return to a better quality of life.

The overall goal of this study is to design a gait generation mechanism for rehabilitation …

Wet-Spinning And Thermal Analysis Of Collagen Fibers Incorporating Hydroxyapatite In Mixed And Coated Form, Sandesh Nathaniel Prakash

Theses

The composition of natural bone comprises of collagen (Cg) as organic phase which acts as a matrix and inorganic calcium phosphate, particularly hydroxyapatite (HA), which is used as reinforcement. This study involved the wet-spinning of collagen fibers incorporating HA in mixed and coated form. The weight percent ratio of collagen and HA in the composite fibers was 95 to 5 respectively. HA coating on pure collagen fibers was achieved by immersing them in HA solution formed by mixing HA in water. With Thermomechanical analysis, the highest breaking point temperature was obtained for the composite fibers and the least with pure …

An Analysis Of Changes In The Magnetic Field Of Active Region 9415 After The 2001 April 6 Solar Flare, Juli Marya Stoltz

Theses

The objective of this study was to further the current understanding of the correlation between solar flares and magnetic flux change. The average gradient of the magnetic flux around the neutral line of Active Region 9415 and the locations of the magnetic flux centers-of-mass in both polarities in AR 9415 were determined. Subsequent to the 2001 April 6 flare, there was a statistically significant mean increase of 0.00208 G/km in the average gradient. Prior to the flare, the magnetic flux centers-of-mass became increasingly sheared along the neutral line. After the flare, this shear suddenly decreased and the magnetic flux centers-of-mass …

Science Assessment Of Deaf Students: Considerations And Implications Of State Accountability Measurements, Julie Mountain

Theses

As states increasingly require students to take standardized tests, it's crucial to examine the ability of such tests to accurately reflect actual student knowledge and skill within content domains. This project reviews the literature about assessment in general and written text features problematic to deaf readers. It seeks to analyze the content breadth and depth as well as the text readability and other linguistic features of Massachusetts' and New York's high school physics tests. Finally, it considers the use of tests with their potential linguistic bias for making decisions about student content mastery and potentially other high stakes decisions such …

Automated Liquid Dispensing Pin For Dna Microarray Applications, Suganya Parthasarathy

Theses

This thesis describes the research and development of a new liquid dispensing/aspiring system that is capable of producing micro sized spots/droplets for molecular biology research and analysis. In particular, the application is focused on DNA microarray fabrication with the goals of smaller spot size, higher yield, more efficient usage of biological materials, and capability to handle high viscosity liquids. The new system is based on active sensing and control and it is part of a fully integrated robotic microarray system for genomic and proteomic applications. The prototype system handles water as well as thick liquids such as 100% glycerol and …

Political Humor In Late-Night Television: A Quantitative And Qualitative Examination Of Late-Night Talk Show Monologues, Eileen Shannon

Theses

This study examines political trends that existed in late-night talk show monologues throughout October 2004. Designed to detect which candidates and issues were addressed, along with the degree to which hosts positively or negatively framed the candidates, the results clarify the issues and people that the public was familiar with.

The monologues of The Tonight Show with Jay Leno and The Late Show with David Letterman were examined. A content analysis and a semantic differential scale distinguished important issues, candidates and the framing of those candidates. Trends within each show were noted.

The results show President George W. Bush as …

Chasing The Track, Tony Nicholas

Theses

This thesis explores the search for a creative process that satisfies my urge to combine photography with imagery and objects from personal and mass media sources, revealing the artist's hand in the work. This work also explores the use of a subject as a means to finding a working process and its importance in that discovery.

Auto racing motivated me to study photography, thus the use of automobile culture, with an emphasis on the subculture of auto racing is a key element in this work. Juxtaposing unrelated materials and imagery was a new experience. As I worked, the evolving imagery …

It Was Enjoyable Doing Whatever You Wanted, Leyla Safavi

Theses

Not Included

The Effective Management Of A Recycling Program At A Large Manufacturing Facility, Michael D. Nersinger

Theses

Some companies have realized the benefits associated with an effective recycling program. Xerox Corporation is one of those companies. Effective recycling can bring revenue to a company, while reducing costs associated with waste disposal. Additionally, they may be seen as good corporate citizens to their stakeholders, which can be used as an important marketing tool for the sales force.

This project examined the effective management of a recycling program at a large facility. Xerox Corporation's facilities located in Monroe County, New York have had recycling programs in place for over a decade. Because the program was mature and continued to …

A Numerical Method For Determining Photoconductor Mobilities, Carol Panepinto

Theses

A photoconductor's mobility is a measure of the speed at which electrons migrate through the material under the influence of an electric field. The mobility determines how long a packet of charge takes to go through the photoconductor. It also determines how much and in what manner the E-field changes during the packet transit. The problem in which we are interested is inferring the mobility of a photoconductor from time-of-f light measurements, that is, from measurements of the current produced per unit time by a known charge packet. Mathematically, the problem is an initial-boundary value problem for a nonlinear, non-local, …

Parts-Based Object Detection Using Multiple Views, David Higgs

Theses

One of the most important problems in image understanding is robust object detection. Small changes in object appearance due to illumination, viewpoint, and occlusion can drastically change the performance of many object detection methods. Non-rigid object can be even more difficult to reliably detect. The unique contribution of this thesis was to extend the approach of parts-based object detection to include support for multiple viewing angles. Bayesian networks were used to integrate the parts detection of each view in a flexible manner, so that the experimental performance of each part detector could be incorporated into the decision. The detectors were …

Constructed Memories, Biffy Borg

Theses

Memories, like the gelatin that coats our photographs, affix themselves to precious family images. These photographs provide us with stories either remembered or retold. However, similar to the actual memories, the photographs only provide a partial story. A moment in time captured on film. Once the shutter clicks, once the moment takes place, it is gone, and those within the borders of the frame no longer exist. Once the moment is over, it begins to recede into memory. The preciseness of detail begins to mutate. Therefore, both the memory and image are suspect.

Through my thesis work, I explore this …

Quest For Balance, Holly Brown

Theses

This thesis project is documented in two separate parts. The first part consists of the exploratin and execution of six sculptures. The second is in the form of a written thesis, which will discuss the transformation of an idea, my influences, a body of work and the beginning of a visual voice. This project centers on the idea of a visceral state versus an intellectual state as part of the human condition. My interest lies in the interaction between these two states and how we as individuals balance them. For this project I classified an intellectual state to revolve around …

Perceived Social Support And Well-Being Among Gay And Lesbian Parents, Valerie Weck

Theses

Parents who identify as gay or lesbian often face discrimination from the majority population based their sexual orientation. Additionally, gay and lesbian parents may be subject to discrimination from the single-gay and lesbian community for their parental status. However, families of this type continue to grow in number and seem to fare well in the face this adversity. Research to date has not explored the resources that gay and lesbian parents rely on in order to rise above intolerance and promote healthy development of the family. Due to the abundance of literature emphasizing the importance of social support to measures …

A Procedure For Imposing A Dichotomous Incidence Variable On The Weighting Of Items In A Dual Scaling Analysis Of Successive-Categories (Rating) Data, Adam Wyse

Theses

Demographic information collected on surveys is often of certain interest to those who use these surveys to measure customer satisfaction or do market research. This thesis presents a method for imposing a dichotomous incidence variable, possibly a demographic variable, on the weighting of items in a set of successive-categories (rating) data using dual scaling. The idea is to augment the matrix of rating data with the "criterion variable" containing the dichotomous information so that this item determines one of the initial solutions of the dual scaling analysis. In conjunction with the augmentation of the criterion item, the original data are …

Product Development Knowledge-Processing System, Jiefei Qiu

Theses

This thesis develops a methodology that integrates Quality Function Deployment (QFD), Theory of Inventive Problem Solving (TRIZ) and Design Structure Matrix (DSM) to address the problem of analyzing, interpreting, and transforming the knowledge data flow during the product development process.

A product development process is the sequence of steps an enterprise takes to conceive, design, and commercialize a product. The general process includes: Planning, Concept Development, System-Level Design, Detail Design, Testing and Refinement, and Production Ramp-Up. One way to think about the development process is as a knowledge-processing system.

Prior to this study, there are few articles integrating TRIZ and …

Analytical And Numerical Modeling, Fabrication And Rf Measurement Techniques For Rf Planar Micro-Inductors On Silicon, Daniel W. Brown

Theses

In mixed signal integrated circuits, the role of passives has become increasingly important. In particular, the characterization and implementation of an embedded planar coil inductor presents several challenges. The present work is a comprehensive study of micro inductors that includes analytical modeling, numerical simulation, in-house fabrication processes, circuit implementation in silicon, and RF measurement techniques. Although the inductor is widely integrated on silicon, there is still a need for closed form expressions for inductance and the quality factor. In addition, amongst the numerous commercially available simulation packages, there still is a need to identify the tool that best suits the …

High Temperature Effect Of Geopolymeric Coatings On Concretes, Natalya Privorotskaya

Theses

Microstructure and thermal properties of inorganic geopolymeric materials synthesized from metakaolin at 65°C have been investigated for their further application as a thermal barrier for concrete structures. Thermogravimetric analysis of two geopolymer compositions revealed good thermal stability of this material at temperatures of up to 1000°C. Substantial expansion of the samples with addition of silica were observed during heat treatment at 450°C and 800°C, accounting for the differences in microstructure between the two compositions as was seen with scanning electron microscope. Infrared analysis revealed the presence of additional structural groups for silica-containing specimens.

The ability of mortar samples to withstand …

The Use Of Technical Metadata In Still Digital Imaging By The Newspaper Industry, Howard Vogl

Theses

Newspapers are increasingly capturing images digitally. Included with these digital files is technical information about the conditions of the image and the conditions surrounding image capture. Technical metadata has the potential to be a valuable resource in image reproduction, management, and archiving. Nevertheless, even though digital devices capture a large amount of technical metadata, the use of such data in the digital imaging workflow is not widespread. The use of technical metadata requires a uniform set of technical metadata standards and an open encoding scheme to embed data. From their inception, image file formats, such as TIFF and JPEG, have …

Isoelectric Point Prediction From The Amino Acid Sequence Of A Protein, Matthew Conte

Theses

Proteins often do not migrate as expected in two dimensional electrophoresis based on their primary sequence. The predicted isoelectric point (pI) frequently does not coincide with experimental pI values obtained in the laboratory. The reasons for these differences led to this study. Initially, 2DE data from the E. coli proteome was collected and formatted. This dataset was split into three parts each consisting of different levels of pI discrepancy (ΔpI). The protein sequence data for each ΔpI subset was run through a pipeline. At each stage of the pipeline the data were analyzed by comparing each of the three ΔpI …

Modeling Of A Hardware Vlsi Placement System: Accelerating The Simulated Annealing Algorithm, William Merle Batts Jr.

Theses

An essential step in the automation of electronic design is the placement of the physical components on the target semiconductor die. The placement step presents the opportunity to reduce costs in terms of wire length and performance degradation; however it is compute intensive and is NP-complete in terms of obtaining an optimal solution. As designs have grown in complexity and gate count, obtaining an optimal solution is not feasible due to time to market constraints or sheer compute effort required. Heuristic algorithms allow for efficient but sub-optimal designs to be produced with a reduction in processing time. A widely used …

Proposed Exergetic Based Leak Detection And Diagnosis Methodology For Automotive Carbon Dioxide Air Conditioning Systems, Erin Canfield

Theses

Due to the overwhelming concern of global warming and ozone depletion, the replacement of many currently used refrigerants is a pressing matter within all sectors of refrigeration. Presently, the hydroflourocarbon (HFC) 134a, the working fluid of automotive air conditioning (AC) systems, greatly contributes to global warming as the result of system leakage. Both chemical and natural refrigerant losses impose threats to the environment and human health as well as reduce operational efficiency which increases energy consumption. If no action is taken to replace the chemical refrigerants, then it is proposed that the emissions from fluorinated gasses would increase from 65.2 …

Dynamic Characteristics Of A Hyperboloid Shell Of Revolution With Application To Flexible Couplings, Brian G. Towner

Theses

A hyperboloid shell of revolution (HSR) is proposed for implementation as a coupling, into a fullly integrated driveshaft/coupling assembly. The dynamics of the coupling is not clearly understood, which prompts the need for an analytic investigation of the hyperboloid shell of revolution. The hyperboloid shell of revolution is one in which the meridian of the shell is defined by the equation of a hyperbola. Two methods are utilized to find the first bending frequency of the HSR: Finite Element Method and the Assumed Mode Shape Method. the Fiinite Element Method is applied to Timoshenko Beam Theory, and Galerkin's Assumed Mode …

Vision-Based Hand Shape Identification For Sign Language Recognition, Jonathan Rupe

Theses

This thesis introduces an approach to obtain image-based hand features to accurately describe hand shapes commonly found in the American Sign Language. A hand recognition system capable of identifying 31 hand shapes from the American Sign Language was developed to identify hand shapes in a given input image or video sequence. An appearance-based approach with a single camera is used to recognize the hand shape. A region-based shape descriptor, the generic Fourier descriptor, invariant of translation, scale, and orientation, has been implemented to describe the shape of the hand. A wrist detection algorithm has been developed to remove the forearm …

Linux Os Emulator And An Application Binary Loader For A High Performance Microarchitecture Simulator, Scott Warner

Theses

Simulation is a critical step in the development of state of the art microprocessors. Accurate simulation allows designers to confidently investigate various designs, while fast simulation times allow designers to thoroughly explore a design space. RITSim is an endeavor to create a high accuracy, high quality microarchitecture simulation infrastructure. This simulation infrastructure will be available for academic research in low power and high performance computer systems. The scope of this work is to provide a Linux OS Emulator, a Binary Application Loader, and a Linux kernel running in a virtual environment for the RITSim project. In order to evaluate standard …

Detecting Glaucoma In Biomedical Data Using Image Processing, Mittal Bhatt

Theses

This thesis addresses the problem of the early detection of an eye blinding disease, glaucoma. It presents new approaches for analysis of the biomedical scan data of Retinal Nerve Fiber Layer (RNFL) thickness obtained through Scanning Laser Polarimetry that can lead to better tools for early diagnoses of glaucoma. The thickness maps of the RNFL obtained from a Scanning Laser Polarimeter (Gdx-VCC) were used to draw features as opposed to the circular ring one-dimensional data (TSNIT graph) in previous approaches. Fourier analysis and wavelet analysis were performed on the 900 projections of the thickness map data to emphasize the shape …