Engineering Commons^™

Regression Tree Predictive Filter, Jarren Worthen

Undergraduate Honors Capstone Projects

Many algorithms have been developed to predict future samples of a signal. These algorithms, such as the recursive least squares predictive filter, rely on the assumption that the system generating the signal can be modeled as a linear system of equations. These systems perform poorly when used to predict signals generated by non-linear systems. To predict a non-linear signal, non-linear methods must be used. Regression trees are a simple form of machine learning that is non-linear in nature and can predict output based on a set of given input. The goal of this capstone project was to develop an algorithm …

Electric Power Grid Resilience Under Extreme Weather Events, Orlando Quezada Simental

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Electric power distribution grids are experiencing blackouts at higher rates than ever before due to extreme weather, leaving hundreds of customers without electric energy for hours or even days. While these events are considered low-probability events, the socioeconomic costs and impacts are extensive as the distribution systems are unreliable under emergency events. The improvement of the resilience of the power distribution system can be accomplished through the implementation of microgrids (MGs) throughout the grid, which can be constituted by distributed energy resources (DERs) such as solar roof-top PV generation and electric vehicles (EVs) and many others. The development of new …

Grid-Connected Renewable Energy Systems For Residential Hvac Load Management, Oscar Samuel Acosta

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

With an ongoing mission of utility operators to maintain a resilient and reliable power grid in the face of continuously increasing load demand, it is essential that advancements be made in developing both technology and methodology to help account for the increasing energy requirements. According to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) and Energy Information Administration (EIA), the residential end-use sector alone counted for 22% of all electricity used in the U.S. in 2020. Of this, approximately 32% of household electricity load is the direct result of air conditioning and space heating units (HVAC). One way to account for this …

Development Of An Automated Electronic Prototyping System, Cesar Yahir Sanchez Zambrano

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Prototyping systems with interconnected components can be a time and resource expensive process. The process consists of three main phases (design, build and analysis) with each having their own associated cost. For the case of electronic circuits, the building phase is the costliest phase among the three, being prone to human errors which causes the circuit to fail. All three phases of the prototyping process are important. However, often a disproportionate amount of time is spent on the build phase due to the difficulty of making and troubleshooting circuits by hand. In this thesis we will discuss a system that …

The Mobility And Cognitive Mechanisms Involved In Altering Gait Speed In Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Alyssa Olivas

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Autism is a socio-behavioral disorder, and diagnoses are conducted through behavioral screening instruments. Recent research suggests motor deficits may be a core symptom of the disorder, as children with autism present with deficits in motor development, locomotor skills, and postural instability. In addition, children with autism often have affected, executive function, attention, and perception cognitive domains. Different gait speeds have been used to examine gait adaptations in other clinical populations. Additionally, individuals with decreased cognitive abilities have demonstrated difficulties in modulating their walking speed. There is limited research on mechanisms children with autism use to alter their gait speed, or …

Efficient And Secure Resource Allocation In Mobile Edge Computing Enabled Wireless Networks, Qun Wang

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

To support emerging applications such as autonomous vehicles and smart homes and to build an intelligent society, the next-generation internet of things (IoT) is calling for up to 50 billion devices connected world wide. Massive devices connection, explosive data circulation, and colossal data processing demand are driving both the industry and academia to explore new solutions.

Uploading this vast amount of data to the cloud center for processing will significantly increase the load on backbone networks and cause relatively long latency to time-sensitive applications. A practical solution is to deploy the computing resource closer to end-users to process the distributed …

Analysis And Optimization Of The Two-Phase Series Capacitor Buck Dc-Dc Converter, Salahaldein Ali Aboajila Ahmed

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Current sharing schemes for conventional multi-phase converters are based on sensing each phase current to deliver the current information to their controllers. In conventional buck converters, this fact may require a preset current sharing ratio at the expense of efficiency, which eventually requires a larger sensing circuit to achieve the sensing accuracy of each phase. Introducing the concept of automatic current sharing is one of the solutions to tackle this issue. Automatic current sharing (Current Sharing Mechanism CSM) is an advanced way to distribute heat generation in multi-phase switching topologies at full load. A two-phase series capacitor buck converter (2-pscB) …

Diffusive Dynamics Of Biological Macromolecules In The Cytoplasm Of Live Bacteria, Asmaa Sadoon

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Bacteria are small organisms that play important roles in our bodies and in maintaining our surrounding environment. However, bacterial infections are considered as one of the health diseases that threatens the lives of humans. Resistance of bacteria to antibiotics has made treating bacterial infections more challenging. With the emergence of many developed optical techniques, it has become possible to study various biological mechanisms of molecules inside these small organisms with high resolution and precise localization. In this research, single particle tracking photoactivation localization microscopy (sptPALM) technique was used to investigate the dynamics of fluorescent histonelike nucleoid-structuring proteins (H-NS) in live …

Junction Temperature Estimation Of Silicon Carbide Power Module Using Internal Gate Resistance As Temperature Sensitive Electrical Parameter, Michael Sykes

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The junction temperature of a power module is measured non-intrusively and uninterrupted in its application by analyzing the dependency of gate resistance to temperature. The circuit configuration proposed consists of altering the gate loop path and adding a basic peak detection circuit with an added low-pass filter to accurately measure the small differences seen during a temperature change on the internal gate resistance. The testing on this Silicon Carbide power module shows that the internal gate resistance has a positive temperature coefficient. This causes the current and the voltage drop on the gate loop sensing resistance to reduce as the …

Structural Checking Tool Restructure And Matching Improvements, Derek Taylor

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

With the rising complexity and size of hardware designs, saving development time and cost by employing third-party intellectual property (IP) into various first-party designs has become a necessity. However, using third-party IPs introduces the risk of adding malicious behavior to the design, including hardware Trojans. Different from software Trojan detection, the detection of hardware Trojans in an efficient and cost-effective manner is an ongoing area of study and has significant complexities depending on the development stage where Trojan detection is leveraged. Therefore, this thesis research proposes improvements to various components of the soft IP analysis methodology utilized by the Structural …

High Power Density And High Efficiency Converter Topologies For Renewable Energy Conversion And Ev Applications, Dereje Lemma Woldegiorgis

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation work presents two novel converter topologies (a three-level ANPC inverter utilizing hybrid Si/SiC switches and an Asymmetric Alternate Arm Converter (AAAC) topology) that are suitable for high efficiency and high-power density energy conversion systems. The operation principle, modulation, and control strategy of these newly introduced converter topologies are presented in detail supported by simulation and experimental results. A thorough design optimization of these converter topologies (Si/SiC current rating ratio optimization and gate control strategies for the three-level ANPC inverter topology and component sizing for the asymmetric alternate arm converter topology) are also presented.

Performance comparison of the proposed …

Radiomic Features To Predict Overall Survival Time For Patients With Glioblastoma Brain Tumors Based On Machine Learning And Deep Learning Methods, Lina Chato

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Machine Learning (ML) methods including Deep Learning (DL) Methods have been employed in the medical field to improve diagnosis process and patient’s prognosis outcomes. Glioblastoma multiforme is an extremely aggressive Glioma brain tumor that has a poor survival rate. Understanding the behavior of the Glioblastoma brain tumor is still uncertain and some factors are still unrecognized. In fact, the tumor behavior is important to decide a proper treatment plan and to improve a patient’s health. The aim of this dissertation is to develop a Computer-Aided-Diagnosis system (CADiag) based on ML/DL methods to automatically estimate the Overall Survival Time (OST) for …

Insole Fall Prevention Device, Nick M. Hughes, Andrew M. Slaboda

Biomedical Engineering

Falls among the aging population occur every single day, with 1 in every 5 resulting in some injury and 300,000 hospitalized every year with a hip fracture [1]. The most popular and effective way to mitigate these falls is through physical therapist intervention. However, with the increased popularity in telerehab, many patients at risk for falls cannot accurately convey their gait tendencies to their physical therapists from the comfort of their home or while not in direct contact with the PT. A device like an insole, implanted with force sensors, which measures different parts of a patient’s foot, could convey …

Control, Decision-Making, And Learning Approaches For Connected And Autonomous Driving Systems With Humans-In-The-Loop, Fangjian Li

All Dissertations

By virtue of vehicular connectivity and automation, the vehicle becomes increasingly intelligent and self-driving capable. However, no matter what automation level the vehicle can achieve, humans will still be in the loop despite their roles. First, considering the manual driving car as a disturbance to the connected and autonomous vehicles (CAVs), a novel string stability is proposed for mixed traffic platoons consisting of both autonomous and manual driving cars to guarantee acceptable motion fluctuation and platoon safety. Furthermore, humans are naturally considered as the rider in the passenger vehicle. A human-centered cooperative adaptive cruise control (CACC) is designed to improve …

Design & Analysis Of Mixed-Mode Integrated Circuit For Pulse-Shape Discrimination, Bryan Orabutt

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

In nuclear science experiments it is usually necessary to determine the type of radiation, its energy and direction with considerable accuracy. The detection of neutrons and discriminating them from gamma rays is particularly difficult. A popular method of doing so is to measure characteristics intrinsic to the pulse shape of each radiation type in order to perform pulse-shape discrimination (PSD).

Historically, PSD capable systems have been designed with two approaches in mind: specialized analog circuitry, or digital signal processing (DSP). In this work we propose a PSD capable circuit topology using techniques from both the analog and DSP domains. We …

Modern Optimal Controllers For Hybrid Active Power Filter To Minimize Harmonic Distortion, Feras Alasali, Khaled Nusair, Husam Foudeh, William Holderbaum, Arangarajan Vinayagam, Asma Aziz

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Nowadays, AC distributed power networks are facing many challenges in guaranteeing and improving the required level of power quality indices in power networks with increasing nonlinear, time-variable and unbalanced loads. Power networks can benefit from avoiding and minimizing different AC problems, such as frequency fluctuation and Total Harmonic Distortions (THDs), by using power filters, such as Hybrid Active Power Filters (HAPFs). Therefore, attention towards responsible power quality indices, such as Total Harmonic Distortion (THD), Power Factor (P.F) and Harmonic Pollution (HP) has increased. THD and HP are important indices to show the level of power quality at the network. In …

Development Of High Conductivity Copper Coatings For Srf Cavity, Himal Pokhrel

Physics Theses & Dissertations

The development of metallic coatings with high purity and high thermal conductivity at cryogenic temperature could be very important for application to the superconducting radiofrequency (SRF) cavity technology. The deposition of such bulk coatings on the outer surface of a niobium cavity could result in higher heat conductance and mechanical stiffness, both of which are crucial for enhancing the cavity performance at a reduced cost.

Cold spray technology was used to deposit bulk coatings of pure copper and copper-tungsten alloys on the niobium substrate and the samples of size 2 mm × 2 mm cross section were cut and subjected …

Optimization Of 8-Plate Multi-Resonant Coupling Structure Using Class-E2 Based Capacitive-Wireless Power Transfer System, Yashwanth C. Bezawada

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Capacitive-wireless power transfer (CPT) effectively charges battery-powered devices without a physical contact. It is an alternative to inductive-wireless power transfer (IPT) which is available in the present market. Compared with IPT, CPT offers flexibility in designing the coupling section. Because of its flexibility, CPT utilizes various coupling methods to enhance the coupling capacitance. Misalignment is a common issue in any WPT system. Among IPT and CPT, IPT has better performance for misalignments, but it requires bulk and expensive ferrite core to attain a high coupling coefficient. This work focuses on designing a CPT system to minimize the impact of misalignments. …

Machine Learning Classification Of Digitally Modulated Signals, James A. Latshaw

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Automatic classification of digitally modulated signals is a challenging problem that has traditionally been approached using signal processing tools such as log-likelihood algorithms for signal classification or cyclostationary signal analysis. These approaches are computationally intensive and cumbersome in general, and in recent years alternative approaches that use machine learning have been presented in the literature for automatic classification of digitally modulated signals. This thesis studies deep learning approaches for classifying digitally modulated signals that use deep artificial neural networks in conjunction with the canonical representation of digitally modulated signals in terms of in-phase and quadrature components. Specifically, capsule networks are …

Frequency Agile Ofdm System For Radio Communication In High Frequency Bands, Erin E. Hill

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

High Frequency (HF) radio communication existed as the primary source of over-the-horizon communication for decades prior to the wide implementation of satellite and cellular networks. Even today, should satellite communication become unavailable, the robust backup of HF vitally supports long distance data transmission without the need of a cellular infrastructure. This capability is of particular importance to naval applications while at sea. Frequency choice, however, becomes critical in supporting reliable HF communication as too high of a frequency will not return to earth and too low of a frequency will result in high absorption rates within the atmosphere. A potential …

Design And Analysis Of Electrical Power And Communication Systems For 3u Sealion Cubesat Mission, Joseph D. Siciliano

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Old Dominion University (ODU) Space Systems students in conjunction with the United States Coast Guard Academy (USCGA) are designing and developing a 3U Very Low Earth Orbit (VLEO) CubeSat mission aptly named SeaLion. This work specifically details the design of the Electrical Power System (EPS) and Communication System of the satellite. Electrical power in orbit is a precious commodity and must be carefully regulated and distributed to ensure the satellite’s operational health. Commonly, CubeSat electrical power is retained in orbit via outward facing solar cells and stored in onboard rechargeable batteries. This thesis proposes using non-rechargeable primary battery cells and …

Development Of A Fuzzy Logic Model-Less Aircraft Controller, Christopher M. Scott

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

The Modeling and Control for Agile Aircraft Development (MCAAD) group at NASA Langley Research Center(LaRC) is developing techniques for Real-Time Global Modeling (RTGM) and Robust Learning Control (RLC) for NASA’s Transformational Tools and Technologies Project. This project seeks to develop a systematic approach to reduce the iterative nature of aircraft design by introducing a model-less control law and enabling inflight aerodynamic modeling and controller design. The development of the flight control system without prior knowledge of the aircraft aerodynamic model makes use of TakagiSugeno-Kang fuzzy logic inference systems for pitch and roll controllers and are tested in various simulations and …

Failure Mode, Effects And Criticality Analysis Of A Very Low Earth Orbit Cubesat Mission, Robb Christopher Borowicz

Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering Theses & Dissertations

When space programs launch vehicles into orbit, multiple failures could arise throughout the mission and corrective actions are often not an option. Applying reliability engineering approaches during the design phase focuses on analyzing risk by anticipating potential failures and mitigating uncertainties in the design. Old Dominion University, in partnership with the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, and the U.S. Air Force Institute of Technology designed and developed a 3U CubeSat mission to validate on-orbit, three space technology payloads. Mission SeaLion will fly as a secondary payload on stage two of Northrop Grumman’s Antares rocket and will be deployed in a very …

Electromagnetic Modeling Of A Wind Tunnel Magnetic Suspension And Balance System, Desiree Driver

Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Wind tunnels are used to study forces and moments acting on an aerodynamic body. While most results involve some interference from the mechanical supports used to hold the model, a Magnetic Suspension and Balance System (MSBS) is void of these interferences and presents an ideal test scenario. To further investigate the feasibility of dynamic stability testing at supersonic speeds using a MSBS, a preliminary design idea is currently being developed using an existing MSBS in a subsonic wind tunnel. This review focuses on the development of a mathematical model to more accurately portray the capabilities of the 6 inch Massachusetts …

A Preventive Medicine Framework For Wearable Abiotic Glucose Detection System, Saikat Banerjee

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

In this work, we present a novel abiotic glucose fuel cell with battery-less remote access. In the presence of a glucose analyte, we characterized the power generation and biosensing capabilities. This system is developed on a flexible substrate in bacterial nanocellulose with gold nanoparticles used as a conductive ink for piezoelectric deposition based printing. The abiotic glucose fuel cell is constructed using colloidal platinum on gold (Au-co-Pt) and a composite of silver oxide nanoparticles and carbon nanotubes as the anodic and cathodic materials. At a concentration of 20 mM glucose, the glucose fuel cell produced a maximum open circuit voltage …

Fabrication Of Nmos Logic Gates, Samantha Hahn

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

NMOS logic gates were a predecessor to the CMOS logic gates widely used today. They allow for easier process steps and take into account the limited equipment that is available in the ODU clean room. In this thesis, NMOS logic gates were studied in order to open a new field of research into logic gates at Old Dominion University. This work focuses mostly on the designs of the mask patterns and the design of the fabrication process. NOT, NOR, NAND, OR, and AND gates were fabricated with transistors with a 75 µm gate length, using masks and processes specifically developed …

Chen-Fliess Series For Linear Distributed Systems, Natalie T. Pham

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Distributed systems like fluid flow and heat transfer are modeled by partial differential equations (PDEs). In control theory, distributed systems are generally reformulated in terms of a linear state space realization, where the state space is an infinite dimensional Banach space or Hilbert space. In the finite dimension case, the input-output map can always be written in terms of a Chen-Fliess functional series, that is, a weighted sum of iterated integrals of the components of the input function. The Chen-Fliess functional series has been used to describe interconnected nonlinear systems, to solve system inversion and tracking problems, and to design …

Low-Latency And Fresh Content Provision In Information-Centric Vehicular Networks, Shan Zhang, Junjie Li, Hongbin Luo, Jie Gao, Lian Zhao, Xuemin Sherman Shen

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

In this paper, the content service provision of information-centric vehicular networks (ICVNs) is investigated from the aspect of mobile edge caching, considering the dynamic driving-related context information. To provide up-to-date information with low latency, two schemes are designed for cache update and content delivery at the roadside units (RSUs). The roadside unit centric (RSUC) scheme decouples cache update and content delivery through bandwidth splitting, where the cached content items are updated regularly in a round-robin manner. The request adaptive (ReA) scheme updates the cached content items upon user requests with certain probabilities. The performance of both proposed schemes are analyzed, …

Design Of Wideband Decoupling Networks For Mimo Antennas Based On An N-Ary Optimization Algorithm, Min Li, Kwan Lawrence Yeung, Lijun Jiang, Ross Murch

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Techniques for reducing the coupling between antenna elements in multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) systems are important for achieving the full potential of MIMO. In this article, a general and systematic method is developed to design a wideband decoupling and matching network (DMN) for MIMO antenna arrays. The DMN is formed by grid-like transmission lines interconnected by lumped components, whose reactance can be obtained from an N-ary optimization algorithm. Four design benchmarks are performed for validating decoupling methodology, elaborating on design/implementation procedure, and demonstrating superiority of the proposed method. Results show that the DMN achieves broad isolation bandwidth while occupying a small …

Sizing Battery Energy Storage And Pv System In An Extreme Fast Charging Station Considering Uncertainties And Battery Degradation, Waqas Ur Rehman, Rui Bo, Hossein Mehdipourpicha, Jonathan W. Kimball

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This paper presents mixed integer linear programming (MILP) formulations to obtain optimal sizing for a battery energy storage system (BESS) and solar generation system in an extreme fast charging station (XFCS) to reduce the annualized total cost. The proposed model characterizes a typical year with eight representative scenarios and obtains the optimal energy management for the station and BESS operation to exploit the energy arbitrage for each scenario. Contrasting extant literature, this paper proposes a constant power constant voltage (CPCV) based improved probabilistic approach to model the XFCS charging demand for weekdays and weekends. This paper also accounts for the …