Engineering Commons^™

Differentiation Of Ipscs Into Cardiomyocytes Utilizing Extracellular Matrix, Arthur Castleton, Alonzo Cook

Journal of Undergraduate Research

According to the American Heart Association, Ischemic heart disease is the principal cause of death. Many potential therapies are being simultaneously explored and among the most promising is tissue engineering of cardiac scaffolds. In vitro culturing of mature cardiomyocytes has the potential to lay the foundation for products such as cardiac patches for treatment of early stages of Ischemic heart disease or atrial septal defects, and developing entire replacement hearts. However, cardiomyocyte cell culture and experimentation has encountered various difficulties; the inability to proliferate, incomplete maturation, and having a small window of functional contraction. Conversely, iPSCs can partially differentiate into …

Large Body Influence In Internal Wave Generation, Austin Maxwell, Julie Crockett

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Internal waves are three dimensional waves that propagate within a stratified fluid. They are able to propagate in all directions within our atmosphere and the oceans which are both stratified fluids of continuously changing densities. Internal waves are much larger than surface waves, having wavelengths of hundreds of kilometers and amplitudes more than a kilometer in height. Due to their large size they can be difficult to study in nature, and there is still much to be learned about these waves and their impact on the environment. My research has focused on the generation of internal waves by the motion …

Pluripotent Stem Cell (Ipsc) Differentiation To Kidney Phenotype With Conditioned Media Of Rctes, Angela Nakalembe, Dr. Alonzo Cook

Journal of Undergraduate Research

According to the latest U.S. Renal Data System Annual Data Report, more than 660,000 Americans are currently being treated for kidney failure, also called end stage renal disease (ESRD). The current treatment options, dialysis and kidney transplants, work well in some instances but have disadvantages, such as the inability to perform hormone regulation and potential organ rejection respectively.

The overall aim of our work is to create bioengineered kidneys that will provide alternative solutions to the current treatment methods without any of the drawbacks. New breakthroughs in the biomedical world support the theory that organs can be grown from cultured …

Biosensor System For The Detection Of Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals, Conner Earl, Bradley Bundy

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Endocrine Disrupting Chemicals (EDCs) present problems worldwide and have been linked to cancer, developmental disorders, and other epigenetic complications. Many of these complications could be mitigated if not eradicated if these chemicals were better characterized and detectable, however an inexpensive, reliable and field deployable sensor for EDCs has yet to be developed. The purpose of this project was to explore the idea of an engineered Cell Free biosensor system that is an economic, viable method for the rapid detection of EDCs.

Portable Food & Water Sanitation By Means Of Energetic Photons, Jordan Argyle, Matthew Memmott

Journal of Undergraduate Research

At least 1 in 10 people across the globe do not have access to clean water.¹ The World Health Organization considers food and drink contamination to be “the most widespread health problem in the contemporary world.”² An estimated 600 million people fall ill from eating contaminated food or drinking contaminated water every year, of which nearly half a million die. Most of those illnesses are caused by pathogens rather than chemical contamination.³

Analysis Of Magnetic Resonance Imaging Of Peripheral Nerve Regeneration, Jaron Lundwall, Alonzo Cook

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Due to accident-related neural damage, many people’s lives are impaired or limited in what they can do. Current medical practices are limited at helping distal and proximal nerve stubs regenerate. Many recent research studies have focused on trying to improve this problem by understanding how cut or crushed nerves heal. This study focused on helping these efforts by improving non-invasive analysis techniques of nerve growth. Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) is one possible solution to creating a reliable analysis technique that in the future could be used on humans. We have shown that Magnetic Resonance Imaging can be used without invasive …

Characterization Of Polyester Polymer Concrete Material Properties, Robert Stevens, Dr. W. Spencer Guthrie

Journal of Undergraduate Research

The purpose of this project was to investigate selected material properties of polyester polymer concrete (PPC) using laboratory testing. PPC is a synthetic concrete that combines sand and coarse aggregate with a polyester resin binder that takes the place of conventional portland cement. PPC is commonly used as an overlay material on bridge decks. There is some ambiguity about several important mechanical properties of PPC, including coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE), degree of hardening, and modulus of elasticity. The objective of this research was to investigate the effect of temperature on these properties. The results of this research will help …

Time-Difference Amplifier For Time-To-Digital Converters, Matthew Padilla, Dr. Shiuh-Hua Wood Chiang

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Currently most digital converters convert from an analog voltage signal to a digital signal. In recent years some progress has been made in converting from an analog time signal to a digital signal. The purpose of this project is to improve upon current designs of time-to-digital converters by making a time-difference amplifier that is more power efficient and less sensitive to variation.

Currently time-to-digital converters are commonly implemented similarly to analog voltage-to-digital converters, using a two-step architecture [1]. In a voltage-to-digital converter, the first stage is a coarse quantizer, and the difference between the voltage signal and the quantization is …

The Effect Of Soaking Time On The Accuracy Of A Vertical Impedance Spectroscopy Probe, Jared Baxter, Brian Mazzeo

Journal of Undergraduate Research

According to the U.S. Department of Transportation, nearly 10% of the nation’s 611,845 brides are structurally deficient. (https://www.fhwa.dot.gov/bridge/nbi/no10/defbr15.cfm) This means that nearly 60,000 active bridges are unsafe. This is a major problem, and one that is not easily solved. Many of these bridges are of significant importance to the nation’s highways and cannot be retired without inconveniencing millions of people. Furthermore, to repair or rebuild all of these bridges would take billions of dollars, a cost that far exceeds Federal Highway Administrations (FHWA) funding.

Crispr-Cas9 Directed Pdgf-Β Transcriptional Activation In Fibroblast Cell, Lia Gale, Brian Jensen

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Chronic wounds, particularly in the lower limb, represent a huge physical, financial, and social burden to 50 million people worldwide. In 2014, Americans paid an estimated $25 billion for simple wound care for patients. Despite these efforts, traditional methods of trying to heal wounds from the outside via surgical debridement, anti-inflammatory medications, moisture correction, etc. often fail to close wounds (Demidova-Rice et al., 2012). If wound closure does not occur, infection will cause localized tissue death and can lead to sepsis and death. Unfortunately, this leaves amputation as the only resort when wounds don’t close. If primary amputation occurs, …

Microstructure Correlation With Formability For Biaxial Stretching Of Magnesium Alloy Az31b At Mildly Elevated Temperatures, David T. Fullwood, Isaac Chelladurai, Michael P. Miles, John E. Carsley, Raj K. Mishra, Irene J. Beyerlein, Marko Knezevic

Faculty Publications

Magnesium AZ31B sheets of 2 mm thickness were stretch formed using a 101.6 mm diameter punch at temperatures from 25°C - 150°C, in 25°C increments. Surface strains were measured using a digital image correlation (DIC) method. The punch height vs load curve was found to be the same for temperatures of 25°C and for 50°C, while at 75°C and above the load for a given punch height started to decrease, indicating a potential change in deformation mechanism. Electron Backscatter Diffraction (EBSD) was used to quantify features of the microstructure in the tested specimens. In particular, the gradual decrease in twinning …

It's No Accident: Evaluating The Effectiveness Of Vehicle Safety Inspections, Alex Hoagland, Trevor Woolley

FHSS Mentored Research Conference

Traffic fatalities have fallen steadily over the past two decades, particularly those due to car failure. Many have attributed this fall to safer vehicle technology. This trend has led many states to reevaluate mandatory vehicle safety inspection programs. This study sought to answer the question, does the elimination of vehicle safety inspections have an effect on traffic fatalities?

Triggering The Solar Revolution, Justin Halversen, John Salmon

Journal of Undergraduate Research

The sun’s energy emissions are significantly higher than other alternative energy sources. All other energy sources combined would not provide even one percent of the potential collectible energy from the sun. The amount of potential solar power available is well over 5000 times the current world consumption. Indeed, there is a very large and renewable reservoir of untapped potential solar energy which could be made more directly available to more people.

Cytosolic Delivery Of Doxorubicin From Liposomes To Multidrug-Resistant Cancer Cells Via Vaporization Of Perfluorocarbon Droplets, Jacob B. Williams, Clara M. Buchanan, Ghaleb A. Husseini, William G. Pitt

Faculty Publications

A common mechanism of multidrug resistance is the upregulation of efflux pumps in the cancer cells that can more rapidly export unwanted materials (e.g. cancer drugs) out of the cell, compared to sensitive cancer cells. This research seeks to overcome this mechanism by vaporizing a perfluoropentane emulsion droplet inside of a drug-containing liposome (eLiposome) that was endocytosed into a cancer cell. Folate attached to the eLiposome facilitates uptake into the cell as observed by confocal microscopy. Ultrasound was examined as a trigger to initiate the vaporization of the perfluoropentane droplet and release doxorubicin from folated eLiposomes (feLD). Two seconds of …

Integration Host Factor Stabilized Pcr- Amplified Dna For High-Throughput Protein Synthesis Subtitle, William Bradley, Bradley Bundy

Journal of Undergraduate Research

As the search continues for novel proteins with market-incentivized properties, the demand for tools to accelerate the identification of these proteins increases. This has led to investigating methods for screening proteins that yield faster results (high-throughput) with greater titers of protein stable enough for analysis (high yield).

Tissue Engineering: Cell-Seeded 3d Printed Vascular Graft, Tomonori Baba, Alonzo Cook

Journal of Undergraduate Research

The purpose of this project was to create and test a biocompatible modified alginate gel for 3D printing blood vessels to be used in vascular networks for tissue engineering and as vascular grafts. Vascular disease is the leading cause of death in the United States, and more than $100 billion are spent annually for its treatment. Treatments for cardiovascular disease, such as synthetic blood vessels still have some problems with thrombosis and immune rejection. We propose to use the patient’s own cells to form replacement blood vessels, to reduce the risk of immune rejection and the endothelial cells will be …

The Use Of A Passive Endothermic Reactor Cooling System For Lwr Emergency Cooling, Joel Johnson, Dr. Matthew Memmott

Journal of Undergraduate Research

The purpose of the project was to test the viability and begin design on a passive endothermic reaction cooling system (PERCS). The idea behind PERCS is to improve the safety of and to avoid potential disasters resulting from accident conditions in nuclear reactors. To do this, a PERCS will be designed that can be simply integrated into current nuclear power plant systems. The PERCS concepts to date are completely passive; rather than requiring valve or operator actuation, the system initiates due to natural conditions in the reactor system.

Cytosolic Delivery Of Doxorubicin From Liposomes To Multidrug-Resistant Cancer Cells Via Vaporization Of Perfluorocarbon Droplets, Jacob B. Williams, Clara M. Buchanan, Ghaleb Husseini, William G. Pitt

Faculty Publications

A common mechanism of multidrug resistance is the upregulation of efflux pumps in the cancer cells that can more rapidly export unwanted materials (e.g. cancer drugs) out of the cell, compared to sensitive cancer cells. This research seeks to overcome this mechanism by vaporizing a perfluoropentane emulsion droplet inside of a drug-containing liposome (eLiposome) that was endocytosed into a cancer cell. Folate attached to the eLiposome facilitates uptake into the cell as observed by confocal microscopy. Ultrasound was examined as a trigger to initiate the vaporization of the perfluoropentane droplet and release doxorubicin from folated eLipsosomes (feLD). Two seconds of …

Potential Benefits Of Combining Anomaly Detection With View Planning For Uav Infrastructure Modeling, R. Abraham Martin, Landen Blackburn, Joshua Pulsipher, Kevin W. Franke, John Hedengren

Faculty Publications

This paper presents a novel method for UAV-based 3D modeling of large infrastructure objects, such as pipelines, canals and levees, that combines anomaly detection with automatic on-board 3D view planning. The study begins by assuming that anomaly detections are possible and focuses on quantifying the potential benefits of the combined method and the view planning algorithm. A simulated canal environment is constructed, and several simulated anomalies are created and marked. The algorithm is used to plan inspection flights for the anomaly locations, and simulated images from the flights are rendered and processed to construct 3D models of the locations of …

Developing Hybrid Thickness-Accommodation Techniques For New Origami-Inspired Engineered Systems, Kyler Austin Tolman

Theses and Dissertations

Origami has become a source of inspiration in a number of engineered systems. In most systems, non-paper materials where material thickness is non-negligible is required. In origami-inspired engineered systems where thickness is non-negligible, thickness-accommodation techniques must be utilized to overcome the issue of self-intersection. Many thickness-accommodation techniques have been developed for use in thick-origami-inspired-engineered systems. In this work several thickness-accommodation techniques are reviewed and discussed. New thickness-accommodation techniques including hybrid thickness-accommodation techniques and the split vertex technique are presented and discussed. These techniques enable new capabilities of thickness-accommodation in origami adapted design. Thickness-accommodation techniques have been developed in the context …

Gpu Implementation Of Data-Aided Equalizers, Jeffrey Thomas Ravert

Theses and Dissertations

Multipath is one of the dominant causes for link loss in aeronautical telemetry. Equalizers have been studied to combat multipath interference in aeronautical telemetry. Blind equalizers are currently being used with SOQPSK-TG. The Preamble Assisted Equalization (PAQ) project studied data-aided equalizers with SOQPSK-TG. PAQ compares, side-by-side, no equalization, blind equalization, and five data-aided equalization algorithms: ZF, MMSE, MMSE-initialized CMA, and frequency domain equalization. This thesis describes the GPU implementation of data-aided equalizer algorithms. Static lab tests, performed with channel and noise emulators, showed that the MMSE, ZF, and FDE1 show the best and most consistent performance.

Modeling Three Dimensional Ground Reaction Force Using Nanocomposite Piezoresponsive Foam Sensors, Parker Gary Rosquist

Theses and Dissertations

Three dimensional (3D) ground reaction force (GRF) are an essential component for gait analysis. Current methods for measuring 3D GRF involve using a stationary force plate embedded in the ground, which captures the forces as subjects walk across the platform. This approach has several limitations, a few being: it can only capture a few steps at a time, it is expensive to purchase and maintain, it can't reflect forces caused by natural uneven surfaces, etc. Previous research has attempted to develop wearable force sensors to overcome these problems; however, these endeavors have resulted in devices that are expensive, bulky, and …

Integration Of A Complete Detect And Avoid System For Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems, Jared Kevin Wikle

Theses and Dissertations

For unmanned aircraft systems to gain full access to the National Airspace System (NAS), they must have the capability to detect and avoid other aircraft. This research focuses on the development of a detect-and-avoid (DAA) system for small unmanned aircraft systems. To safely avoid another aircraft, an unmanned aircraft must detect the intruder aircraft with ample time and distance. Two analytical methods for finding the minimum detection range needed are described. The first method, time-based geometric velocity vectors (TGVV), includes the bank-angle dynamics of the ownship while the second, geometric velocity vectors (GVV), assumes an instantaneous bank-angle maneuver. The solution …

Surface Acoustic Wave Based Pumping In A Microchannel, Tao Wang, Qi Ni, Nathan B. Crane, Rasim Guldiken

Faculty Publications

Pumping and manipulation of liquids in microfluidic channels is important for many mechanical, chemical and biomedical applications. Surface acoustic wave based devices fabricated on high-efficiency piezoelectric substrates have been recently investigated for mixing and separation application within microfluidic channels. In this paper, we introduce a novel integrated surface acoustic wave based pump for liquid delivery and precise manipulation within a microchannel. The device employs a hydrophobic surface coating (Cytop) in the device design for decreasing the friction force and increasing the bonding. Contrary to previous surface acoustic wave based pump, this device does not need precise layers of water and …

Multipath Channel Considerations In Aeronautical Telemetry, Edem Coffie Gagakuma

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis describes the use of scattering functions to characterize time-varying multipath radio channels. Channel Impulse responses were measured at Edwards Air Force Base (EAFB) and scattering functions generated from the impulse response data. From the scattering functions we compute the corresponding Doppler power spectrum and multipath intensity profile. These functions completely characterize the signal delay and the time varying nature of the channel in question and are used by systems engineers to design reliable communications links. We observe from our results that flight paths with ample reflectors exhibit significant multipath events. We also examine the bit error rate (BER) …

Optimization Under Uncertainty For Wake Steering Strategies, Julian Quick, Jennifer Annoni, Ryan King, Katherine Dykes, Paul Fleming, Andrew Ning

Faculty Publications

Wind turbines in a wind power plant experience significant power losses because of aerodynamic interactions between turbines. One control strategy to reduce these losses is known as 'wake steering,' in which upstream turbines are yawed to direct wakes away from downstream turbines. Previous wake steering research has assumed perfect information, however, there can be significant uncertainty in many aspects of the problem, including wind inflow and various turbine measurements. Uncertainty has significant implications for performance of wake steering strategies. Consequently, the authors formulate and solve an optimization under uncertainty (OUU) problem for finding optimal wake steering strategies in the presence …

Engaging Children In Engineering Design Through The World Of Quadcopters, Greg J. Strimel, Scott R. Bartholomew, Eunhye Kim

Faculty Publications

The interest in engineering education for K-12 students has been rising (Carr, Bennett IV, & Strobel, 2012; Strimel, Grubbs, & Wells, 2016), and the importance of engineering education is discussed as early as the elementary school level (Hegedus, 2014). Petroski (2003) claims that children are ready to learn engineering because their play activities are similar to engineering and design activities, such as making, moving, and rearranging things. Studies have examined how elementary school students perceive engineering or engineers (Cunningham, Lachapelle, & Lindgren-Streicher 2005) and found that elementary-aged students associated engineering with repairing, installing, driving, constructing, and improving machines and devices. …

Designing The Technological World Through Biomimicry, Emily Yoshikawa, Greg J. Strimel, Scott R. Bartholomew

Faculty Publications

Scientific discoveries are a driver for advancing our technological world (ITEA/ITEEA; 2000/2002/2007). As more knowledge is acquired through scientific inquiry, people can better design and develop technological inventions and innovations (Knowles, Kelley, & Hurd, 2016). In turn, these novel technologies can aid in making new scientific discoveries, thus driving an ongoing cycle of technological advancement. However, in the process of designing and advancing our technological world, people can turn to the study of life and its phenomena to inspire and inform their designs. Nature is functional as well as beautiful. As we study the phenomena or functions of living organisms …

Computer-Aided Design Integration In Virtual Reality Design Reviews For Improved Interaction With Engineering Models, Ian James Freeman

Theses and Dissertations

Leveraging virtual reality (VR) technology to enhance engineering design reviews has been an area of significant interest for researchers since the advent of modern VR. The ability to interact meaningfully with 3D engineering models in these VR design reviews is an important, though often neglected, capability due to the difficulty of performing data translation between native CAD data and VR compatible file formats. A bi-directional interface was developed between a VR design review environment and a commercial CAD package that streamlines the data translation process. By transmitting both geometric data and selected metadata from the CAD system an improved format …

Probing The Effects Of Surface Hydrophobicity And Tether Orientation On Antibody-Antigen Binding, Derek B. Bush, Thomas A. Knotts Iv

Faculty Publications

Antibody microarrays have the potential to revolutionize molecular detection for many applications, but their current use is limited by poor reliability, and efforts to change this have not yielded fruitful results. One difficulty which limits the rational engineering of next-generation devices is that little is known, at the molecular level, about the antibody-antigen binding process near solid surfaces. Atomic-level structural information is scant because typical experimental techniques (X-ray crystallography and NMR) cannot be used to image proteins bound to surfaces. To overcome this limitation, this study uses molecular simulation and an advanced, experimentally validated, coarse-grain, protein-surface model to compare fab-lysozyme …