Engineering Commons^™

Monitoring Of Applied Stress In Concrete Using Ultrasonic Full-Waveform Comparison Techniques, Ali Hafiz

Student Research Symposium

Ultrasonic testing is a non-destructive approach commonly used to evaluate concrete structures. A challenge with concrete is that it is heterogeneous, which causes multiple wave scattering resulting in longer and more complex wave paths. The recorded ultrasonic waveform can be divided into two portions: the coherent (or early) and the diffuse (or Coda) portion. While conventional methods only use the coherent portion, e.g. the first wave arrival to determine the wave velocity, we are interested in the entire waveform, i.e. until the wave amplitude is completely dampened out. The objective of this study was to determine what portion of the …

Validation Of Postural Sway Measurements Using Wii Balance Board, Zachary Meade

UNO Student Research and Creative Activity Fair

Standing balance measurements, such as postural sway, are vital for determining functional ability, risk of falling and recovery of injuries. Often the need to collect data outside of the typical clinical or research setting arises. However, obtaining these measurements outside of a laboratory setting can be very difficult, as the mobility of a laboratory-grade force plate (FP) is minimal, and its cost can be upwards of $20,000. The purpose of this study is to create a cheaper alternative by validating the Wii Balance Board’s (WBB; Nintendo, Redmond, Washington, USA) ability to measure postural sway patterns. The WBB can be acquired …

On Utilizing Big Data To Assess Health Levels, Elham Rastegari

UNO Student Research and Creative Activity Fair

The general relationship between mobility/gait patterns and health conditions, has been established by many research studies. Gait patterns have been used in predicting fall incidents, assessing the movement of people with Parkinson disease and assessing gait characteristics of patients with major depression. However, not much has been reported in terms of how to utilize mobility data along with gait patterns to assess health levels and to identify early stages of certain diseases or conditions that impact mobility/gait patterns. In this project, we propose to develop a population analysis system based on recent Big Data technologies that relies on different types …

Autonomous Uav Navigation In An Indoor Environment For Warehouse Inventory Recording, Venkat Ramana Reddy Garlapati

UNO Student Research and Creative Activity Fair

UAV’s are currently used extensively in outdoor environments for various applications, including wildfire monitoring, and agricultural surveying, their use in indoor applications have been fairly restricted, owing mainly to the difficulty to maneuver them in smaller indoor spaces and the inability to use GPS-based navigation system. Nevertheless, there are many indoor applications where UAVs could provide a safe, reliable and resilient means to perform operations that are dangerous for humans such as surveillance inside chemical plants, inventory scanning in cold storages etc., Autonomous UAV navigation in an indoor environment can be achieved by finding a collision-free flight path to pass …

A Hierarchical Learning Model For Extracting Public Health Data From Social Media, Elham Rastegari

UNO Student Research and Creative Activity Fair

In decision making processes, particularly when it comes to health-related decisions, each relevant piece of information is important. This is particularly important when it comes to health conditions for which there remains a high degree of non-determinism as far as diagnosis and treatment. Online social media, are places in which people feel free to share their opinions about numerous topics, including public health issues and how individuals have responded to different types of treatments associated with diseases. social media could represent a secondary source that can be used as a supplement to other data sources. This would allow individuals as …

Solar Energy R & D Project: Teachers Incorporating Stem- Modules To Yield An Energy Literate Generation, Tricia Kirkland, Lindsay Snowden

ENERGY Research and Lesson Plans

Background- Photovoltaic (PV) cells produce the largest amount of electricity when they are directly facing the sun. Solar panels that use tracking systems to position the panel to constantly face the sun have the greatest efficiency. But, these systems are expensive.

Aim- Design a dual axis tracking solar panel with microcontroller and sensors (light, humidity, temperature, and compass) that are both cost effective and efficient. Sensors will be used to determine performance depending on environmental factors.

Ethics Statement: Researchers will keep honest, clear, and accurate records when collecting all data in lab and communication of information learned.