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Full-Text Articles in Engineering

Probabilistic Multivariate Time Series Forecasting And Robust Uncertainty Quantification With Applications In Electricity Price Prediction, Jie Han Dec 2023

Probabilistic Multivariate Time Series Forecasting And Robust Uncertainty Quantification With Applications In Electricity Price Prediction, Jie Han

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Electricity price forecasting (EPF) is a crucial task for market participants seeking informed decisions in day-ahead electricity markets. The increasing penetration of stochastic renewable energy and the deregulation of electricity markets pose challenges to electricity price forecasting. Given the dependence of electricity prices on stochastic factors such as weather conditions, market dynamics, and customer behaviors, deterministic forecasting methods offer limited insight into the potential future states of energy prices in highly stochastic markets. In this study, a transformer-based electricity price forecasting (TDEPF) model was developed, utilizing a two-step training process and demonstrating superior performance compared to typical RNN models. Subsequently, …


Towards Sustainable Additive Manufacturing: Assessment Of Cost, Greenhouse Gas Emission, And Recyclability, Lei Di Aug 2023

Towards Sustainable Additive Manufacturing: Assessment Of Cost, Greenhouse Gas Emission, And Recyclability, Lei Di

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Additive Manufacturing technologies fabricate 3D objects layer by layer following a predesigned CAD model. Owing to the unique layer-wise production method, additive manufacturing offers competitive advantages in comparison with traditional subtractive manufacturing, such as shortened production time, increased design freedom, improved manufacturing capability and complexity, and reduced manufacturing waste. Numerous research studies have been conducted to design, understand, and improve additive manufacturing technologies in order to facilitate the implementation in the supply chain. On the other hand, with the rapid growth of additive manufacturing, sustainability issues that exist on both process level and supply chain level have started to receive …


Increasing The Safety Of Bicyclists Using A Cyclist Behavior Questionnaire And A Smartphone Based Application, Anika Jannat Rimu Aug 2023

Increasing The Safety Of Bicyclists Using A Cyclist Behavior Questionnaire And A Smartphone Based Application, Anika Jannat Rimu

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

ABSTRACT: Bicycling is beneficial for health, the environment, road users’ flexibility, and personal expenses. Compared to motor vehicles, they are an active mode of transport, cause minimum pollution, are affordable, and can easily navigate through the increasing traffic all over the world. This increase in traffic, however, also increases the possibility of crashes with motor vehicles. Bicyclists, being more exposed to traffic than drivers, suffer fatal consequences from a crash. Therefore, a standard tool is required to understand bicyclist behavior on the road. This tool can provide insights into bicyclists’ behavior so that appropriate infrastructure or policy changes can be …


Applications Of Probability Of Success In The Well Delivery Process To Improve Risk, Opportunity, And Cost Assurance, Romar Alexandra Gonzalez Luis Aug 2023

Applications Of Probability Of Success In The Well Delivery Process To Improve Risk, Opportunity, And Cost Assurance, Romar Alexandra Gonzalez Luis

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Oil and Gas (O&G) well drilling is risky and expensive. The cost of drilling is typically underestimated, and there is little understanding of the certainty or Probability of Success (POS) of achieving the well objectives within the estimated cost. This dissertation presents, for the first time, a publicly available POS Cost method/tool that enables O&G operators to estimate the cost of well drilling substantially more accurately and improve the POS of accomplishing the drilling for the estimated cost. This POS Cost method employs a comprehensive, expert-based assessment of risks and risk mitigations that are incorporated into a Monte-Carlo-based simulation of …


Topics In Optimization For Sustainable Energy Planning, Bahareh Nasirian Aug 2023

Topics In Optimization For Sustainable Energy Planning, Bahareh Nasirian

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

ABSTRACT: Due to the current trend of rising energy demand, finding alternate energy sources is vital. Many cities consider renewable energy as a component of a sustainable future. Typically, organic wastes are considered renewable energy sources. Wastes can be converted to proper energy forms using waste-to-energy technologies. On the other hand, more renewable energy sources in the power system may increase energy market stochasticity, alter system operation, and pose new problems for the current supply and demand equilibrium, which consequently requires new control methods. Hence, taking into account the issues mentioned above, in this research, we address organic waste conversion …


Machine Learning For Ultraviolet Spectral Prediction, Linh Ho Manh May 2023

Machine Learning For Ultraviolet Spectral Prediction, Linh Ho Manh

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Machine Learning has found wide applications in material science, including dielectric polymers, superconducting materials, and drug property prediction. The use of data analytics and machine learning methods to predict Vacuum Ultraviolet (VUV) spectra by encoding molecular structure is gaining interest because high-quality VUV spectral prediction capability would enable the study of new molecules without costly wet-lab measurements. This dissertation aims to study feature representations for molecular structures that enhance the prediction of VUV spectra via machine learning models. Both interpretable machine learning and deep learning are studied. Chapter 1 provides an overview of VUV/UV spectra retrieval, and Chapter 2 reviews …


Forming Coalitions And Sharing Payoffs In N-Person Normal Form Games, Emma Owusu Dwobeng Dec 2022

Forming Coalitions And Sharing Payoffs In N-Person Normal Form Games, Emma Owusu Dwobeng

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

For a given n-person normal form game, we form all possible sets of mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive coalitions of the n players. For each set of coalitions, we define a coalitional semi-cooperative game as one in which these coalitions are taken as the players of this new game, each coalition tries to maximize the sum of its individual players’ payoffs, and the players within a coalition cooperate to do so. For any coalitional semi-cooperative game, the goal of the original n players is to improve their individual payoffs obtained in a Greedy Scalar Equilibrium (GSE) of the original game, …


Lasso Based State Transition Modeling With Interactions In Adaptive Interdisciplinary Pain Management, Amith Viswanatha Aug 2022

Lasso Based State Transition Modeling With Interactions In Adaptive Interdisciplinary Pain Management, Amith Viswanatha

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

The Eugene McDermott Center for Pain Management at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center has an interdisciplinary pain management program for chronic pain. This program treats patients with a holistic view of reducing chronic pain and improving their physical, mental, and social well-being through treatment interventions. The development of an adaptive treatment decision tool is main goal of the research project. This program is modeled as a two-stage adaptive treatment decision problem, with state transition models representing the transition of patient state, treatment, and outcome variables from stage 1 to stage 2. Interactions between the patient state and treatments …


A Hybrid Systems Model For Emergency Department Boarding Management, Eniola Oluwasola Suley Aug 2022

A Hybrid Systems Model For Emergency Department Boarding Management, Eniola Oluwasola Suley

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

The purpose of this research is to examine methods for minimizing the influence of boarding on emergency department (ED) crowding outcomes. To accomplish this purpose, this research uses a hybrid systems model framework by combining agent-based simulation, predictive and optimization models to improve ED outcomes such as length-of-stay and left-without-being-seen rates. For the research, different types of simulation models were examined (discrete event and agent-based/discrete event combination) to identify the most parsimonious for studying ED boarding. Predictive models using simulation output were developed to understand the factors that influence future boarding levels as well as generate predictions. Research has previously …


Optimizing The Performance Of Analytical Chemistry Instrumentation, Srividya Sekar May 2022

Optimizing The Performance Of Analytical Chemistry Instrumentation, Srividya Sekar

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Surrogate Optimization and Global Optimization approaches to optimize underlying functions have been studied and used extensively in the field of Operations Research. However, there are very few instances where these approaches have been applied and tested in applications with uncertainty. Additionally, extensive focus and effort have been put into developing highly complex metamodels rather than globally optimizing these metamodels. In this study, we propose a Mixed Integer Quadratically Constrained Program (MIQCP) based approach that globally optimizes a Quintic Multivariate Adaptive Regression Splines (QMARS) metamodel. The QMARS-MIQCP based optimization is applied to a global optimization framework called QMARS-MIQCP-OPT to optimize several …


Affordable Autonomous Vehicles For Deployment After Disastrous Events, Shannon Abolmaali May 2022

Affordable Autonomous Vehicles For Deployment After Disastrous Events, Shannon Abolmaali

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

In disastrous events such as hurricanes and tornadoes, it has been observed that people get stranded and helpless without a feasible way to escape during those emergency situations. This became very evident during hurricanes, such as Katrina and Ida affecting millions of people seeking immediate rescue efforts. With the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning, we envision an autonomous vehicle, AV, which is able to find the most optimal and safest way to help those who are stranded to get them to a safe location. Electric vehicles, EV, and Autonomous Vehicles, AV, is becoming the future; minimizing the carbon …


Leveraging Ai And Supply Chain Technologies With Thermal Imaging And Telemedicine For Early Detection And Prevention Of Covid-19 And Respiratory Infections In Urm Communities, Gohar Azeem May 2022

Leveraging Ai And Supply Chain Technologies With Thermal Imaging And Telemedicine For Early Detection And Prevention Of Covid-19 And Respiratory Infections In Urm Communities, Gohar Azeem

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

The underserved population could be at risk during the times of crisis, unless there is strong involvement from government agencies such as local and state Health departments and federal Center for Disease Control (CDC). The COVID-19 pandemic was a crisis of different proportion, creating a different type of burden on government agencies. Vulnerable communities including the elderly populations and communities of color have been especially hard hit by this pandemic. This forced these agencies to change their strategies and supply chains to support all populations receiving therapeutics. The National Science Foundation (NSF Award # 2028612) funded this research to help …


Evaluating And Addressing The Transportation Challenges Of Small-Scale Farmers And Ranchers In Regional Food Systems, Narjes Sadeghiamirshahidi May 2022

Evaluating And Addressing The Transportation Challenges Of Small-Scale Farmers And Ranchers In Regional Food Systems, Narjes Sadeghiamirshahidi

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

During the last 20 years, there has been a significant increase in US consumers’ interest in local food. At the same time, there is substantial potential demand for crops produced by local small and mid-size farmers and ranchers whose market channels are short distance distributions Although there is a variety of definitions for local food, it often refers to direct-to-customer market channels for farmers and ranchers, including farmers’ markets and Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), as well as distribution through local businesses like restaurants, grocery stores, as well as local institutions such as hospitals and schools. However, small and mid-size farmers …


A Systematic Stakeholder-Driven Framework For Empirical Characterization And Parameterization Of Human Agents For Agent-Based Modeling Of Older Adults' Transportation, Nilufer Oran Gibson Dec 2021

A Systematic Stakeholder-Driven Framework For Empirical Characterization And Parameterization Of Human Agents For Agent-Based Modeling Of Older Adults' Transportation, Nilufer Oran Gibson

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Standard of living for health and well-being of oneself and of one’s family is a human right. Vulnerable populations are incapable of maintaining an adequate standard of living due to several reasons, such as financial constraints, racial profiling, health conditions, aging, and the combination of these reasons. To alleviate their vulnerability, the most basic needs of the vulnerable populations must be met. Transportation is the essential link to the resources to address the basic needs of the vulnerable populations. Transportation solutions tailored for vulnerable populations to meet their basic needs have multiple dimensions that require the involvement of all government …


Design For Older Adults – Functional Limitations And Human Factors Engineering, Megumi Sato Hice Dec 2021

Design For Older Adults – Functional Limitations And Human Factors Engineering, Megumi Sato Hice

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Background: Throughout the aging process, people experience changes in functional ability and such changes can happen in physical and mental functions. As a result, older adults develop limitations in their capabilities to perform daily activities. Although many studies have done to identify functional limitations for elderly, many older adults still face negative consequences in daily living conditions due to their functional declines. One of the possible causes may be a lack of feedback or participations of elderly users in the design process. Other reason could be a lack of consideration to identify the needs for a specific task associated with …


Constraint Optimal Selection Techniques (Costs) For A Class Of Linear Programming Problems, Tai-Kuan Sung Dec 2021

Constraint Optimal Selection Techniques (Costs) For A Class Of Linear Programming Problems, Tai-Kuan Sung

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

This dissertation describes two classes of Constraint Optimal Selection Techniques (COSTs). An algorithm of each type is developed for solving nonnegative linear programming problems. In addition, geometric interpretations of these new algorithms are given, computational results for some large-scale problems are provided, and directions for future research are discussed.


Machine Learning Framework For Nonlinear And Interaction Relationships Involving Categorical And Numerical Features, Shirish Mohan Rao Aug 2021

Machine Learning Framework For Nonlinear And Interaction Relationships Involving Categorical And Numerical Features, Shirish Mohan Rao

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Traditionally, physical scientific experiments have been conducted extensively to study and understand the behavior of a process or a system. With the advancement of computing technology in recent years, computer codes and algorithms are used as simulators to replicate behavior of a complex system. Such use of computers to study a system is termed as ‘computer experiments.’ The process involves selecting specific points or runs in the design space in order to maximize information about the system in minimal runs. These computer models are high dimensional and can take a long time to simulate. Metamodels (or surrogate models) built using …


Agent-Based Model Simulation For Police Deployment Decision-Making In Patrol Operations, Yasaman Ghasemi Aug 2021

Agent-Based Model Simulation For Police Deployment Decision-Making In Patrol Operations, Yasaman Ghasemi

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Police patrolling plays a key role in responding to 911 calls and reducing crimes. The effectiveness of patrol operations heavily depends on the deployment of police officers – e.g., the number of officers assigned to specific policing districts or beats. The complex nature of the policing system – dynamic and stochastic criminal behavior, compounded with limited policing resources, render current (traditional) police operations, which are often managed in a reactive and stationary manner – often makes it very challenging to manage and control. This study develops an agent-based simulation framework to address the dynamically changing environment in police operations and …


Shape-Based Time Series Mining For Process Monitoring And Anomaly Detection, Li Zhang Aug 2021

Shape-Based Time Series Mining For Process Monitoring And Anomaly Detection, Li Zhang

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Due to the rapid development of computing and sensing technology, Internet of Things (IoT)-enabled monitoring plays a crucial role for people suffering from cardiac problems. It is important to detect the abnormal ECG cycles during the cardiac monitoring for the early treatment. However, most existing methods focused on the full reading of time series, for the cycle-based time series, it is wasting time to read the whole time series while we can find the characteristic patterns instead. Characteristic patterns named shapelets are time series subsequences, which are explainable and discriminative features that can best classify time series. Shapelet-based classification that …


Bidding Enabled Inventory Redistribution In A Retail Network, Hafsa Binte Mohsin May 2021

Bidding Enabled Inventory Redistribution In A Retail Network, Hafsa Binte Mohsin

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

This research aspires to develop a systematic approach to minimize the demand and supply gap of products and product expiration in a feasible way. Inventory replenishment policy, uncertain customer demand, and forecast inaccuracy are some of the reasons that create imbalanced stocks in the outlets. Lateral transshipment or redistribution, donation, and promotion have been discussed in the existing literature separately as ways to balance and utilize inventory. Redistribution needs to account for extra transportation costs due to stock transfer. Existing literature on redistribution fails to address products’ physical attributes, valuation of products as a function of time, and constraint on …


Teenage Cyclists’ Perception Towards Autonomous Vehicles And Its Associated Traffic Infrastructures, Obiageli Lawrentia Ngwu May 2021

Teenage Cyclists’ Perception Towards Autonomous Vehicles And Its Associated Traffic Infrastructures, Obiageli Lawrentia Ngwu

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Background: Cycling is a cost-effective means of transportation. Many teenagers cycle to go to schools and ride in neighborhoods. Cyclists are more vulnerable to injuries and fatalities than motor vehicle drivers. With the implementation of autonomous vehicles (AVs), interactions between AVs and road-users are expected to be safer. It is most likely that current young people will be the ones to use these vehicles and interact with them. However, very few past studies have focused on cyclist-AV interaction, with little to no attention toward the teenage cyclist population. Objectives: This study is aimed at examining teenage cyclists’ perceptions of AVs …


Using Empirical Data To Design And Validate Hybrid Simulation Models Of Human Behavior In Service Operations, Mohammed Farhan May 2021

Using Empirical Data To Design And Validate Hybrid Simulation Models Of Human Behavior In Service Operations, Mohammed Farhan

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

The purpose of this research is to examine how a change in a team member's role, team dynamics, and organizational policies impact an individual's motivation to engage in helping behavior, as well as the impact of helping behavior on service system operational performance. To analyze these behavioral dynamics in a dynamic setting, this research integrates empirical human behavioral data into a hybrid discrete-event and agent-based simulation model of service operations in a restaurant. The model was then validated using Metamorphic Testing (MT), an approach that has previously been used for verification of software. Recent research shows that MT can be …


A Comparative Assessment Of Co2 Emission Between Gasoline, Electric, And Hybrid Vehicles: A Well-To-Wheel Perspective Using Agent-Based Modeling, Mdmamunur Rahman Aug 2020

A Comparative Assessment Of Co2 Emission Between Gasoline, Electric, And Hybrid Vehicles: A Well-To-Wheel Perspective Using Agent-Based Modeling, Mdmamunur Rahman

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Road transports in the U.S. are almost entirely dependent on the consumption of fossil fuel. This high dependency on fossil fuel is significantly contributing to carbon dioxide (CO2) emission, one of the leading Green House Gases (GHGs) responsible for global warming. Electrification of passenger vehicles could be an effective strategy to curb GHG emissions. Though Electric Vehicles (EVs) have zero tailpipe emissions, the power required to charge EV batteries may not necessarily come from carbon-free power plants. In this study, for a comprehensive comparison between EV and Gasoline Vehicle (GV), we developed an agent-based simulation model for the entire energy …


A Biomechanical Approach To Investigate The Effects On The Lumbosacral Joint, Pelvis, And Knee Joint While Of Carrying Asymmetrical Loads, During Ground Walking., Tomal Das Aug 2020

A Biomechanical Approach To Investigate The Effects On The Lumbosacral Joint, Pelvis, And Knee Joint While Of Carrying Asymmetrical Loads, During Ground Walking., Tomal Das

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Spinal pain is reasonably considered among the expensive and impairing problems critically disturbing the health of individuals, especially the workforce, in industrially developed countries (Steele et al., 2003). The pain adversely affecting the lumbar region or pelvis is typically considered as low back pain. As per the National Institute of Neurological Disorder and Stroke, around 80 percent of grown-ups encounter spinal pain eventually in the course of their lifetime. The possible risk factors include age, fitness level, genetics, weight gain, occupational risk factors such as having a job that expects someone to do lifting, carrying, pushing, pulling, distorting the spinal …


A Two-Stage Stochastic Programming Model For Enhancing Seismic Resilience Of Water Pipe Networks, Azam Boskabadi Aug 2020

A Two-Stage Stochastic Programming Model For Enhancing Seismic Resilience Of Water Pipe Networks, Azam Boskabadi

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Earthquakes are sudden and inevitable disasters that can cause enormous losses and suffering, and having accessible water is critically important for earthquake victims. To address this challenge, utility managers do preventive procedures on water pipes periodically to withstand future earthquake damage. The existing seismic vulnerability models usually consider simple methods to find the pipes to rehabilitate with highest priority. In this research, we develop an optimization approach to determine which water pipes to rehabilitate subject to a limited budget to achieve highest network serviceability after a disaster. We propose a two-stage stochastic mixed integer nonlinear program (MINLP). The MINLP model …


A New Method To Estimate The Impact On The L5/Si Spinal Disc From Speed Lifting Of Unstable Loads, Asymmetrically, Suhaib Al-Lababidi Aug 2020

A New Method To Estimate The Impact On The L5/Si Spinal Disc From Speed Lifting Of Unstable Loads, Asymmetrically, Suhaib Al-Lababidi

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Background: The most significant causes of lower back injuries at work are probably from manual lifting activities. Lifting unstable loads pose a significant strain to the lower back and can cause debilitating lumbar spine injuries. The primary function of the vertebral column is to support the upper body. The L5/S1 disc junction located between the lumbar and the sacral regions of the vertebral column is the most critical joint in spine with respect to lifting strain. Because of its position and the amount of upper body weight it handles, it is particularly vulnerable to misalignment, wear and tear, and injury.Lifting …


Robust, Time-Critical, Evidence-Based Adaptive Data Fusion, Mohammad Amin Javadi May 2020

Robust, Time-Critical, Evidence-Based Adaptive Data Fusion, Mohammad Amin Javadi

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Sensors have become inevitable part of many studies and working areas ranging from navigation, transportation and medical applications. A sensor can help a user in a variety of situations including dangerous, inaccessible, time and money-consuming circumstances. Applying multiple sensors simultaneously allows for improving the accuracy of measurement estimates for system states. As an example, a part of this study uses a GPS sensor to increase the accuracy of the position estimation obtained by an IMU in an indoor environment. The same GPS device with position outputs can also be studied to provide a new measuring dimension such as velocity. This …


Some New Results On Statistical Information And Evidence, Maryam Moghimi May 2020

Some New Results On Statistical Information And Evidence, Maryam Moghimi

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

This dissertation represents an attempt to relate some fundamental statistical problems using the notions of information, entropy, and evidence.


Identifying And Addressing Improvement Opportunities In Primary Care Clinics, Mozhdeh Sadighi May 2020

Identifying And Addressing Improvement Opportunities In Primary Care Clinics, Mozhdeh Sadighi

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

ABSTRACT: The main aim of this dissertation is to study how unrecognized opportunities for improving efficiency of in-person patient visits in a primary care clinic can be identified and addressed. To fulfill this goal, the research is divided into three distinct but related sections. Section one, with the most holistic view, uses a combination of scientific and rigorous methods along two research paths and, as a result, explores two opportunities for improvement in the clinic. These opportunities are high patient waiting time and unbalanced workload. Sections two and three each focus on underlying conditions driving one of these two opportunities. …


Mathematical Modeling Approaches In Sustainable Food Supply Chains, Amin Gharehyakheh May 2020

Mathematical Modeling Approaches In Sustainable Food Supply Chains, Amin Gharehyakheh

Industrial, Manufacturing, and Systems Engineering Dissertations

Access to high quality and safe food is vital for sustainable development in societies. Perishable foods lose a major portion of their quality after harvesting until the consumption point due to poor storage and distribution conditions. Thus, improvements in food supply chain operations are very critical in the sustainable development of society and the industry. The first part of this dissertation seeks to find a cost-effective and reliable tool to monitor the quality loss and implementation of the least shelf life first-out inventory management policy in food banks. Application of the Gompertz model and Arrhenius equation based on time-temperature data …