Digital Commons Network^™

Modeling Of Wear And Oxidation Behavior Of A Carbon/Carbon Multidisk Clutch, Shankar Nagaraj

Masters Theses

"Carbon/carbon composites are a family of advanced composite materials. They are the most advanced form of carbon and consist of a fiber, based on carbon precursors, embedded in a carbon matrix. They are extensively used in design of sliding contact systems such as clutches and brakes because of their low weight, excellent thermal and mechanical properties, chemical inertness and self lubricating capability. They retain their mechanical strength in inert atmospheres up to 2000° C. However, in oxidizing environments, C/C composites rapidly react with oxygen forming gaseous carbon oxides around 450° C.

In the present study a C/C composite clutch assembly …

Analysis Of Lesion Border Segmentation Using Watershed Algorithm, Hanzheng Wang

Masters Theses

"Automatic lesion segmentation is an important part of computer-based skin cancer detection. A watershed algorithm was introduced and tested on benign and melanoma images. The average of three dermatologists' manually drawn borders was compared as the benchmark. Hair removing, black border removing and vignette removing methods were introduced in preprocessing steps. A new lesion ratio estimate was added to the merging method, which was determined by the outer bounding box ratio. In postprocessing, small blob removing and border smoothing using a peninsula removing method as well as a second order B-Spline smoothing method were included. A novel threshold was developed …

Quench Factor Analysis Of Wrought And Cast Aluminum Alloys, Vishwanath Gandikota

Masters Theses

"Mechanical property variation across the cross section of heat treatable aluminum alloys is a major concern. To minimize such variation, a proper understanding of kinetic transformations and estimation of mechanical properties is required. The Jominy end quench test has been used successfully to study the effect of quench rate on the final heat treated properties of wrought and cast aluminum alloys. This test produces varying cooling rates along the length of a cylindrical sample cooled with water at one end. Jominy bars of wrought and cast aluminum alloys were solutionized, endquenched, and aged to T6 temper condition after delays of …

An Integrated Damping And Strengthening Strategy For Performance-Based Seismic Design And Retrofit Of Highway Bridges, Kazi Rezaul Karim

Masters Theses

"In this study, a damping-enhanced strengthening (DES) strategy was introduced to retrofit bridge structures for multiple performance objectives. The main objectives of this study are (1) to numerically demonstrate the effectiveness of the anchoring mechanism of a constrained damping layer in the proposed DES system, and (2) to evaluate the performances of a highway bridge retrofitted with a DES retrofit technique of viscoelastic (VE) damping and carbon-fiber-reinforced-polymer (CFRP) strengthening components that are nearly independent under weak earthquakes but strongly coupled under strong earthquakes"--Abstract, page v.

Development Of An Electronic Governor System For A Small Spark Ignition Engine, Donald Ray Hibler

Masters Theses

"The use of electronic controls on engines has been widespread and has now reached the small utility engine. The evolution from carburetion to electronic fuel injection has presented opportunity to implement additional controls with the intent to improve engine control and performance. In this study, an electronic governor system is developed for use on a small twin cylinder utility engine. This system is to replace an existing mechanical governor system, and it should have the potential as a production based solution that integrates with an existing fuel injection system. It must improve the speed droop characteristics over the current mechanical …

Automated Offspring Sizing In Evolutionary Algorithms, André Chidi Nwamba

Masters Theses

"Evolutionary Algorithms (EAs) are a class of algorithms inspired by biological evolution. EAs are applicable to a wide range of problems; however, there are a number of parameters to set in order to use an EA. The performance of an EA is extremely sensitive to these parameter values; setting these parameters often requires expert knowledge of EAs. This prevents EAs from being more widely adopted by nonexperts. Parameter control, the automation of dynamic parameter value selection, has the potential to not only alleviate the burden of parameter tuning, but also to improve performance of EAs on a variety of problem …

Filtering, Modeling, And Control Of Axial Force Signals In Friction Stir Welding Processes, Thomas Michael Oakes

Masters Theses

"In Friction Stir Welding Processes, good contact between tool and work piece can be accomplished through control of the axial force signals. A method of stochastic modeling is introduced and used in conjunction with a Kalman filter to develop empirical static and dynamic models relating the axial force to input process parameters. The filtering method reduces signal variance by an order of magnitude. The models are experimentally validated and used to design and implement a general tracking controller with disturbance rejection for axial force control. Online control of the axial force is experimentally validated for bead-on-plate welds using a 6061 …

A Renewable Energy Feasibility Study To Power A Water Supply Pump In Sacala Las Lomas, Guatemala, William Anthony Granich

Masters Theses

"A clean and sufficient source of drinking water can be a challenge to develop in the rural highlands of Guatemala. Installing a submersible pump in a groundwater well can provide a source of water that is free of contamination and yields sufficient water throughout the year. Submersible pumps are typically powered from grid-power; however, an alternative energy source may be considered. An evaluation of the renewable energy resources has been conducted in Sacala las Lomas de San Martin Jilotepeque, Chimaltenango, Guatemala (Sacala). The drilling of a deep groundwater well has been proposed in Sacala to supply the community with sufficient, …

Time-Weighted Average Solid-Phase Microextraction (Twa-Spme) For In-Planta Detection Of Chlorinated Solvents, Emily Moore Sheehan

Masters Theses

"Recent interest in the use of phyto-mapping for plume delineation at contaminated sites has promoted a need for new and innovative sampling techniques. Solid-phase micro-extraction (SPME) methods have been developed as a chemical analysis tool offering fast, simple, non-invasive sampling without the use of solvents. In this study SPME devices were tested for applicability for in-planta detection of chlorinated solvents. To evaluate the use of SPME for VOCs in-planta a number of integrated studies were undertaken. Uptake profiles were developed for nine chlorinated solvents in a liquid polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) matrix with 100 µm Carboxene SPME fibers. Timeweighted average (TWA) sampling …

The Assessment Of Winding Forces Due To Inrush Current In Large Transformers With Heavily Saturated Cores, Richard Howard Palmer

Masters Theses

"It has been suspected that certain high voltage generator step-up transformers due to large inrush current occurring when the transformers were connected to the energized transmission lines but the generators were not operating. Even though the transformers are designed to withstand the winding forces developed under short circuit conditions, the transformers failed when energized. Therefore, to gain further insight into this phenomenon, this research was undertaken. The research evaluates and compares the relative magnitude of the winding forces produced under inrush and short circuit current conditions in transformers of different design and winding configurations"--Abstract, page iv.

Comparison Of Dashboard-Based And Balanced Scorecard-Based Corporate Performance Management System, Lin Zhu

Masters Theses

"Under current hypercompetitive and technology driven economic environment, more companies are using a corporate performance management (CPM) system to gain more accurate understandings of the company goals and strategies and to craft methods of achieving those goals and strategies. While CPM systems are generally implemented in two approaches: dashboard approach and scorecard approach, very few studies examine the effectiveness of each type of CPM systems implementation. Therefore, the main objective of this study is to assess the effectiveness of a dashboard based and a balanced scorecard based corporate performance management system. The effectiveness is examined through management effectiveness, degree of …

Labor Flexibility, Legal Reform And Economic Development, Alvaro Santos

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The current global financial crisis has provoked intense criticism of the regulatory framework for financial markets. Financial market flexibility, once considered the key to successful financial institutions and economic growth, has now come under intense scrutiny. In contrast, labor market flexibility is still promoted by scholars and international policymakers as an essential part of the recipe for economic development. This Article argues that the predominant understanding of labor flexibility is misguided and needs to be revised. To illustrate why, the Article undertakes a critical examination of labor flexibility as developed by a leading World Bank project, called “Doing Business.” It …

Jupiter As Everyman: Michael Reisman And The Scholar As Teacher, James E. Baker

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

These are Chief Judge Baker’s remarks reflecting on the scholarship of Professor Michael Reisman in the field of national security law. Chief Judge Baker comments that Professor Reisman is a prolific writer and Scholar-Teacher dedicated to the study of force, minimization of suffering, and the advancement of human dignity and the law. He discusses how Professor Reisman’s work is distinctive in that it identifies and incorporates the critical influence of process, both formal and informal, in decisionmaking, which sometimes overshadows substance.

A Mobile Water Disinfection Unit Powered By Renewable Energy Systems, Matthew Vitello

Masters Theses

"The current method of disinfection of water used by the United States Army requires a significant amount of mobilization and demobilization time as well as being energy intensive. In an effort to improve small unit mobility a need for a light-weight, low maintenance, highly mobile disinfection system has arisen. In addition to the potential military use, a system of this type could provide a safe drinking water product during the aftermath of natural or man-made disasters, reducing the burden on emergency management services. A prototype system was developed that is self-powered, has low maintenance requirements, and can be stored for …

Is Law An Economic Contest? French Reactions To The Doing Business World Bank Reports And Economic Analysis Of The Law, Anne-Julie Kerhuel, Bénédicte Fauvarque-Cosson

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

The economic analysis of law has provoked strong reactions among French academics, in particular since 2004 when the first of the Doing Business reports was published. French jurists have joined forces to expose the methodological limits inherent to these reports, which rated France a long way behind other legal systems allegedly more able to facilitate business. In its first part, this article examines the various reactions to these reports, almost all of which were published in French only. In the second part, the focus is on the position of economic analysis in French law, its role, and, in particular, the …

Roscoe Pound, Melvin Belli, And The Personal-Injury Bar: The Tale Of An Odd Coupling, Joseph A. Page

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

In the fourth chapter of Patriots and Cosmopolitans: Hidden Histories of American Law, legal historian John Fabian Witt tells the story of a collaboration between storied scholar Roscoe Pound and trial virtuoso Melvin M. Belli, which he calls "among the most startling and yet unremarked-upon relationships in the annals of American law." Witt argues that it both shaped and energized the efforts of personal-injury lawyers to oppose proposals that would shift to the administrative branch of government responsibility for compensating auto-accident victims. Entitled "The King and the Dean," in reference to the media's coronation of Belli as the "King of …

Global Governance: The World Trade Organization's Contribution, Andrew D. Mitchell, Elizabeth Sheargold

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Democracy and administrative law concern ideas of governance, legitimacy, and accountability. With the growth of bureaucracy and regulation, many democratic theorists would argue that administrative law mechanisms are essential to achieving democratic objectives. This article considers the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) contribution to governance both in terms of global administrative law and democracy. In relation to administrative law, it first explores the extent to which the WTO’s own dispute settlement process contributes to this area. Second, it considers the operation of administrative law principles embedded within the WTO Agreements on Members. For example, the WTO Agreements require that certain laws …

Making Sense Of The Establishment Clause, Jeffrey Shulman

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

While the jurisprudence of the Establishment Clause may not make much sense (common or otherwise) as a substantive legal matter, it does make sense as a series of jurisprudential maneuvers by which the Court has sought to make more room for religion in civic life. In fact, there is a method to the “massive jumble... of doctrines and rules” that forms the law of church-state relations. It is the method of a somewhat disorderly retreat from the Constitution’s foundational principle of disestablishment. The accommodations made by the Court to religious belief and conduct have allowed for discrimination against non-religion, edging …

Commentary, Anna Gelpern

Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works

Enforceable promises discourage lying, cheating, and stealing. Contracts that embody such promises shape institutions, distribute power, and organize markets. The Smith-King critique of elite empirical contracts scholarship reveals a field preoccupied with the first set of functions and barely interested in the second. I am loath to second-guess this view without empirical evidence of my own. Instead, I draw from it two sets of implications-one for the substantive study of contracts, the other for the relationship between contract theory and contract empiricism.

Student Perceptions Of Streaming-Media Effectiveness, Sara Floyd Baber

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this mixed-methods study was to investigate cognitive-load theory as applied to the design of streaming media. In this study, student learning preferences and cognitive style were measured on a visualizer-verbalizer scale to determine the perceived importance of visual and audio components of streaming media used to supplement classroom instruction. Additionally, this study investigated cognitive-load theory by assessing attitudes regarding the importance of learner control when accessing streaming media files. The writer used 4 existing visualizer-verbalizer instruments in combination with 1 original survey that was designed to gather student perceptions and attitudes regarding the effectiveness of streaming media …

Contradictory Keats: A Review Of Stanley Plumly's Posthumous Keats: A Personal Biography, Michael Theune

Scholarship

No abstract provided.

"Denmark Our Heritage - America Our Home": Danishness And Roots In A Multicultural World, Trine Tybjerg Holm, Borge M. Christensen

The Bridge

Danishness is flourishing in the U.S.A. at the dawn of the twenty-first century, and it is not difficult to find this Danishness, or rather, to find what Americans consider to be Danishness. When the Danish media focus on Danishness in the U.S., they tend to highlight two areas: Solvang, California, the so-called "Danish Capital of America," and the two "Danish Villages," Elk Horn and Kimballton, Iowa. Today, Solvang has a population of around 5,000 and Elk Horn/ Kimballton around 1,000. However, estimates have 1.5 million tourists visiting Solvang and 80,000 visiting Elk Horn/Kimballton annually. Dannebrog waves on high in both …

Determining The Future Income Of College Students, Paul Oehrlein, '09

Honors Projects

Many people invest a lot of money in order to go to college with the hope that they will eventually be rewarded with higher salaries. This paper attempts to determine what aspects of college are most important in determining the future income of students. In particular, this paper studies whether GPA is an important determinant of income as well as whether some majors are better investments than others after controlling for other factors. In addition, the effect of math and verbal ability on income and how they interact with different fields of study are studied. The data comes from the …

The Clean Water Act And Power Plant Cooling Water Intake Structures, John H. Minan

San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law

The focus of this Article in on a subtler, but no less important, part of the climate change story involving energy and water. The focus in on the federal regulation of existing once-through-cooling (OTC) intake structures that are used by large steam electric-generating power plants. OTC, closed-cycle (CC) cooling, and dry-cooling (DC) each perform the same function, which is the removal of waste heat from the steam cycle after it has generated electricity.
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The elimination of OTC systems would have a salutatory effect on the aquatic environment because fewer marine organisms would be destroyed by impingement and entrainment. But …

Climate Law And Policy In North America: Prospects For Regionalism, Neil Craik, Joseph Dimento

San Diego Journal of Climate & Energy Law

This Article surveys the current bilateral and trilateral initiatives aimed at GHG emission reductions in North America with a view to assessing the nature and potential role of regional climate change law and policy within a broader global framework. In this context, by regional cooperation, we mean cooperation organized on a North American scale. In pursuit of this objective, this Article seeks to identify, first, how climate change mitigation may be regulated usefully on a regional scale, and second, the governance structures and institutions that may be drawn upon to create and implement regional cooperation on climate change. Particular consideration …

The Costs Of The Fourth Amendment: Home Searches And Takings Law, Arianna Kennedy Kelly

MC Law Review

No abstract provided.

The National Trend Of Abolishing Actions For The Alienation Of A Spouse's Affection And Mississippi's Refusal To Follow Suit, Jamie Heard

MC Law Review

Comment

Educating Illinois: Illinois State University, 1857-2007, John B. Freed

Educating Illinois (2000-2018)

Table of Contents: Section 1: The Normal University, 1857-1867 – Introduction – Chapter 1: A Normal School or the Industrial University? – Common Schools – Normal Schools – Denominational Colleges – The Industrial University – The Act of 1857 – Chapter 2: The State University of Illinois, 1857-1867 – Bloomington – The Illinois Natural History Society – Old Main and the Quad – The Civil War – The Feminization of Teaching – The Morrill Act – The Normal University’s Scientific Legacy – The Financial Aftermath – Rewriting the History of the University’s Foundation – Section 2: “A Genuine Normal School,” …

Chairing The Board: The Case For Independent Leadership In Corporate North America, Millstein Center For Corporate Governance And Performance

Ira M. Millstein Center for Global Markets and Corporate Ownership

The number of non-executive chairmen at companies in North America has been increasing year by year. Recent figures, according to the 2008 Spencer Stuart Board Index, indicate that the last decade has seen a growing trend in separating the roles of the Chief Executive Officer (ceo) and the chairman of the board. In 1998, 16% of the s&p 500 featured distinct chairmen. Data shows that in 2008 as many as 39% appoint someone other than the ceo to chair the board. Traditionally, even in companies that split the role, the chairman was not completely independent, but rather commonly the ex-ceo …

Assessment Of Sustainability Of Rural Tourism Villages In Southeastern China Using Sustainable Tourism Development Indicators, Tang Chen

Dissertations and Theses @ UNI

The purpose of this study was to assess sustainability of rural tourism practices in heritage, ecological, and ethnic communities in southeastern China, using sustainable tourism development indicators. The rural tourism communities selected for this study were Tengtou Village in Fenghua, Zhuge Bagua County in Lanxi, and She Minority Village in E Shan Tonglu, representing examples of domestic rural tourism initiatives in China. This study applied the 2004 WTO sustainability indicator model to develop appropriate indicators for assessing sustainability of rural tourism practices in the selected communities, and aimed at answering the following research questions. First, what indicators would be most …