Engineering Commons^™

Computation Of Risk Measures In Finance And Parallel Real-Time Scheduling, Yajuan Li

Dissertations

Many application areas employ various risk measures, such as a quantile, to assess risks. For example, in finance, risk managers employ a quantile to help determine appropriate levels of capital needed to be able to absorb (with high probability) large unexpected losses in credit portfolios comprising loans, bonds, and other financial instruments subject to default. This dissertation discusses the computation of risk measures in finance and parallel real-time scheduling.

Firstly, two estimation approaches are compared for one risk measure, a quantile, via randomized quasi-Monte Carlo (RQMC) in an asymptotic setting where the number of randomizations for RQMC grows large, but …

Optimizing Incentives For Systems With Heterogeneous Agents, Chen Chen

Dissertations

This dissertation explores new models and applications based on the game theory of incentives. This exploration starts with controlling an invasive insect problem to address one of the most significant challenges facing our forests, the invasion of the Emerald ash borer (EAB), a non-native, wood-boring insect that threatens to kill most ash trees in North America, through designing two new cost-sharing programs between the landowners and local governments. Ash trees are one of North America’s most widely distributed tree genera and a vital part of the green infrastructure of cities, where they provide residents with numerous social, economic, and ecological …

Performance Analysis Of The Dominant Mode Rejection Beamformer, Enlong Hu

Dissertations

In array signal processing over challenging environments, due to the non-stationarity nature of data, it is difficult to obtain enough number of data snapshots to construct an adaptive beamformer (ABF) for detecting weak signal embedded in strong interferences. One type of adaptive method targeting for such applications is the dominant mode rejection (DMR) method, which uses a reshaped eigen-decomposition of sample covariance matrix (SCM) to define a subspace containing the dominant interferers to be rejected, thereby allowing it to detect weak signal in the presence of strong interferences. The DMR weight vector takes a form similar to the adaptive minimum …

Low-Reynolds-Number Locomotion Via Reinforcement Learning, Yuexin Liu

Dissertations

This dissertation summarizes computational results from applying reinforcement learning and deep neural network to the designs of artificial microswimmers in the inertialess regime, where the viscous dissipation in the surrounding fluid environment dominates and the swimmer’s inertia is completely negligible. In particular, works in this dissertation consist of four interrelated studies of the design of microswimmers for different tasks: (1) a one-dimensional microswimmer in free-space that moves towards the target via translation, (2) a one-dimensional microswimmer in a periodic domain that rotates to reach the target, (3) a two-dimensional microswimmer that switches gaits to navigate to the designated targets in …

Artificial Neural Networks And Their Applications To Intelligent Fault Diagnosis Of Power Transmission Lines, Fatemeh Mohammadi Shakiba

Dissertations

Over the past thirty years, the idea of computing based on models inspired by human brains and biological neural networks emerged. Artificial neural networks play an important role in the field of machine learning and hold the key to the success of performing many intelligent tasks by machines. They are used in various applications such as pattern recognition, data classification, stock market prediction, aerospace, weather forecasting, control systems, intelligent automation, robotics, and healthcare. Their architectures generally consist of an input layer, multiple hidden layers, and one output layer. They can be implemented on software or hardware. Nowadays, various structures with …

Behavior Of Novel Cementitious Composites For Use In Sustainable Construction And Rehabilitation, Noah A. Thibodeaux

Dissertations

Cementitious composites are a class of cement-based materials that incorporate a cement paste and other constituents to form a composite material. Cementitious composites may include coarse and/or fine aggregate, admixtures, supplementary cementitious materials (SCMs), or fibers in order to achieve a desired workability, strength, or durability property.

Recently, material scientists and engineers have developed a variety of novel cementitious composites for the purpose of new construction, rehabilitation, and reconstruction applications. Such materials can be used to improve the sustainability of civil infrastructure through the use of recycled, repurposed, or low-embodied carbon materials. Since many of the qualification standards and tests …

Digital Image Forensics Via Meta-Learning And Few-Shot Learning, Yuxi Shi

Dissertations

Digital images are a substantial portion of the information conveyed by social media, the Internet, and television in our daily life. In recent years, digital images have become not only one of the public information carriers, but also a crucial piece of evidence. The widespread availability of low-cost, user-friendly, and potent image editing software and mobile phone applications facilitates altering images without professional expertise. Consequently, safeguarding the originality and integrity of digital images has become a difficulty. Forgers commonly use digital image manipulation to transmit misleading information. Digital image forensics investigates the irregular patterns that might result from image alteration. …

Effect Of Current Density Ramping On The Anodic Reaction And Morphology Of Aerospace Aluminum Alloys, Peter Totaro Jr.

Dissertations

Aluminum anodizing has been experimented with and studied over the last century because of its ability to form uniform, well ordered cellular coatings on aluminum alloys. Anodizing aerospace alloys has been problematic, due to the alloying elements used to add strength and resistance to stress cracking corrosion. These intermetallic compounds, i.e., copper and zinc, promote oxygen evolution and stress as they accumulate in and on the surface of the forming aluminum oxide. These inclusions lead to increased electrical resistance that forms porous and flawed coating, which can lead to industrial and field failures. The amount of voltage placed on the …

Sensorimotor Content Of Multi-Unit Activity In The Paramedian Lobule Of The Cerebellum, Esma Cetinkaya

Dissertations

Based on Center for Disease Control and Prevention report 2016, around 39.5 million people in the United States suffer from motor disabilities. These disabilities are due to traumatic conditions like traumatic brain injury (TBI), neurological diseases such as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), or congenital conditions. One of the approaches for restoring the lost motor function is to extract the volitional information from the central nervous system (CNS) and control a mechanical device that can replace the function of a paralyzed limb through systems called Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCI).

One of the major challenges being faced in BCIs and also in general …

Resource Allocation, User Association And Placement For Uav-Assisted Communications, Shuai Zhang

Dissertations

In the past few years, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-assisted heterogeneous network has attracted significant attention due to its wide range of applications, such as disaster rescue and recovery, ground macro base station (MBS) traffic offloading, communications for temporary events, and data collection for further processing in Internet of Things (IoT). A UAV can act as a flying base station (BS) to quickly recover the communication coverage in the disaster area when the regular terrestrial infrastructure is malfunctioned. The UAV-assisted heterogeneous network can effectively provision line of sight (LoS) communication links and therefore can mitigate potential signal shadowing and blockage. The …

Development And Evaluation Of A Hand Exoskeleton For Neurorehabilitation Post Stroke, Ashley Joyce Mont

Dissertations

Stroke affects approximately 800,000 people in the United States each year, and due to its chronic effects, it is one of the leading causes of disability. Many individuals with stroke suffer the loss of motor function in their paretic upper extremity, and longitudinal studies show that 30 — 66% of individuals with hemiplegia fail to regain arm function six months post stroke. After a stroke, the brain undergoes neuroplasticity which will promote recovery of function. Investigators and clinicians are trying to develop rehabilitation interventions that can be designed to promote neuroplasticity, enhancing the recovery outcomes of therapy.

For individuals with …

Modeling Of Two-Dimensional And Biological Materials Towards Diverse Nano-Systems Applications, Jatin Kashyap

Dissertations

This dissertation studies the demonstration of materials ranging from two-dimensional (2D) materials to small bio-molecules using various atomistic/molecular and sub-atomic particles (electron, hole, excitons) modeling techniques for multi-domain applications. Three categories of materials/systems are investigated as follows: 2D materials, biological materials, and complexes of 2D and biological materials.

The first problem demonstrates wrinkles' ubiquitous presence in two-dimensional materials significantly alters their properties. It is observed that water molecules, sourced from ambient humidity or transfer method, can get diffused in between Graphene and the substrate during the Graphene growth. The water diffusion causes/assists wrinkle formation in Graphene, which influences its properties. …

Towards Ensuring Integrity And Authenticity Of Software Repositories, Sangat Vaidya

Dissertations

The software development process comprises a series of steps known as a software supply chain. These steps include managing the source code, testing, building and packaging it into a final product, and distributing the product to end users. Along this chain, software repositories are used for different purposes such as source code management (Git, SVN, mercurial), software distribution (PyPI, RubyGems, NPM) or for deploying software based on container images (Harbor, DockerHub, Artifact Hub). In the recent past, different types of repositories have increasingly been the target of attacks. As such, there is a need for mechanisms to ensure integrity and …

Decoding Human Movement Through Experiments And Simulation, Vishnu Deep Chandran

Dissertations

The ability to walk or move independently plays a decisive role in one's quality of life. This human ability requires complex coordination with several systems, such as the nervous, muscular, skeletal, and sensory organs, to execute movement tasks. Hence, any disorder of these systems from injury, disease, or aging severely affects the ability to walk or move independently. Disabilities that impair movement severely affect the quality of life. Therefore, studying the changes affecting human movement is necessary to improve the lives of individuals with impaired movement. Since human movement is complex and many systems interact in non-intuitive ways, the overarching …

Formation Of Oil Particle Aggregates And The Impact On The Fate Of Oil, Wen Ji

Dissertations

Spilled oil slicks are likely to break into droplets offshore due to wave energy. The fate and transport of such droplets are affected by suspended particles in local marine environment, through forming oil particle aggregates (OPAs). OPA formation is affected by various factors, including the properties of the particles and oil, the mixing energy and duration, etc. To investigate the impact of these factors, lab scale experiments are conducted by using seawater (both artificial and natural) and kaolinite and silica to simulate the formation of OPAs in baffled flasks. In the first experiment, 9 gm and 3 gm spherical silica …

Parameter Selection In Fully Homomorphic Encryption Schemes And Fhe Applications, Cavidan Yakupoglu

Dissertations

Quantum computing has been gaining momentum as a result of recent technological advances. Existing cryptographic systems rely on the difficult problems that can be solved by sufficiently powerful quantum computers. As the quantum age approaches, the desire to discover new difficult problems that cannot be solved by quantum systems has increased. Lattice-based cryptography is a prominent tool for the post-quantum era that facilitates the implementation of encryption systems for practical applications.

The Learning with Error (LWE) and Ring-LWE problems introduce new lattice hardness assumptions that have been incorporated into public-key cryptosystems to facilitate the implementation of numerous privacy-enhancing applications. Fully …

Coupled Oscillators: Protein And Acoustics, Angelique N. Mcfarlane

Theses

This work encompassed three different vibrational energy transfer studies of coupled resonators (metal, topological, and microtubule comparison) inspired by the lattices of microtubules from regular and cancerous cells. COMSOL Multiphysics 5.4 was utilized to design the experiment. The simulation starts with an acoustic pressure study to examine the vibrational modes present in coupled cylinders, representing α-, β-tubulin heterodimers. The Metal Study consisted of 3 models (monomer, dimer, and trimer) to choose the correct height (40 mm) and mode (Mode 1) for study. The Topological Study was run to predict and understand how the lattice structure changes over a parametric sweep …

Back And Shoulder Exoskeletons For Occupational Use: A Review, Erkan Ozan

Theses

Work-related musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) account for a large portion of all work-related injuries according to OSHA. Back and shoulder-related disorders make the most of work-related MSDs according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Exoskeletons emerged in recent years with the potential to reduce the risks of work-related musculoskeletal disorders and injuries. Their use in occupational settings is increasing, and exoskeleton designs are rapidly evolving. This paper reviewed recent scientific articles (2015 and after) that evaluated back and shoulder-support passive industrial exoskeletons. The findings of these articles are summarized and analyzed to assess the benefits of passive upper-body exoskeletons by …

One-Stage Blind Source Separation Via A Sparse Autoencoder Framework, Jason Anthony Dabin

Dissertations

Blind source separation (BSS) is the process of recovering individual source transmissions from a received mixture of co-channel signals without a priori knowledge of the channel mixing matrix or transmitted source signals. The received co-channel composite signal is considered to be captured across an antenna array or sensor network and is assumed to contain sparse transmissions, as users are active and inactive aperiodically over time. An unsupervised machine learning approach using an artificial feedforward neural network sparse autoencoder with one hidden layer is formulated for blindly recovering the channel matrix and source activity of co-channel transmissions. The BSS sparse autoencoder …

Optimizing Speed Profiles For Sustainable Train Operation With Wayside Energy Storage Systems, Leon A. Allen

Dissertations

Large hauling capability and low rolling resistance has put rail transit at the forefront of mass transportation mode sustainability in terms of congestion mitigation and energy conservation. As such, rail vehicles are one of the least energy-intensive modes of transportation and least environmentally polluting. Despite, these positives, improper driving habits and wastage of the braking energy through dissipation in braking resistors result in unnecessary consumption, extra costs to the operator and increased atmospheric greenhouse gas emissions.

This study presents an intelligent method for the optimization of the number and locations of wayside energy storage system (WESS) units that maximize the …

Planning Methodology For Alternative Intersection Design And Selection, Liran Chen

Dissertations

The recent publication of the 6th Edition of the Highway Capacity Manual included a chapter on Ramp Terminals and Alternative Intersections that introduces various alternative intersection designs and assesses the performance of Median U-turn, Restricted crossing U-turn and Displaced left-turn intersections. Missing from the literature is an alternative intersection selection tool for identifying whether an alternative intersection would be successful under local conditions. With limited information of organized alternative intersection research, most planners must rely heavily on their personal judgement while selecting the most suitable intersection designs. As appealing as alternative intersections are, there is no comprehensive methodology for planners …

Nondestructive Evaluation Of 3d Printed, Extruded, And Natural Polymer Structures Using Terahertz Spectroscopy And Imaging, Alexander T. Clark

Dissertations

Terahertz (THz) spectroscopy and imaging are considered for the nondestructive evaluation (NDE) of various three-dimensional (3D) printed, extruded, and natural polymer structures. THz radiation is the prime candidate for many NDE challenges due to the added benefits of safety, increased contrast and depth resolution, and optical characteristic visualization when compared to other techniques. THz imaging, using a wide bandwidth pulse-based system, can evaluate the external and internal structure of most nonconductive and nonpolar materials without any permanent effects. NDE images can be created based on THz pulse attributes or a material’s spectroscopic characteristics such as refractive index, attenuation coefficient, or …

Investigation Of Topological Phonons In Acoustic Metamaterials, Wenting Cheng

Dissertations

Topological acoustics is a recent and intense area of research. It merges the knowledge of mathematical topology, condensed matter physics, and acoustics. At the same time, it has been pointed out that quasiperiodicity can greatly enhance the periodic table of topological systems. Because quasiperiodic patterns have an intrinsic global degree of freedom, which exists in the topological space called the hull of a pattern, where the shape traced in this topological space is called the phason. The hull augments the physical space, which opens a door to the physics of the integer quantum Hall effect (IQHE) in arbitrary dimensions. In …

Improving The Performance And Evaluation Of Computer-Assisted Semen Analysis, Ji-Won Choi

Dissertations

Semen analysis is performed routinely in fertility clinics to analyze the quality of semen and sperm cells of male patients. The analysis is typically performed by trained technicians or by Computer-Assisted Semen Analysis (CASA) systems. Manual semen analysis performed by technicians is subjective, time-consuming, and laborious, and yet most fertility clinics perform semen analysis in this manner. CASA systems, which are designed to perform the same tasks automatically, have a considerable market share, yet many studies still express concerns about their accuracy and consistency. In this dissertation, the focus is on detection, tracking, and classification of sperm cells in semen …

A Self-Learning Intersection Control System For Connected And Automated Vehicles, Ardeshir Mirbakhsh

Dissertations

This study proposes a Decentralized Sparse Coordination Learning System (DSCLS) based on Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL) to control intersections under the Connected and Automated Vehicles (CAVs) environment. In this approach, roadway sections are divided into small areas; vehicles try to reserve their desired area ahead of time, based on having a common desired area with other CAVs; the vehicles would be in an independent or coordinated state. Individual CAVs are set accountable for decision-making at each step in both coordinated and independent states. In the training process, CAVs learn to minimize the overall delay at the intersection. Due to the …

Local Learning Algorithms For Stochastic Spiking Neural Networks, Bleema Rosenfeld

Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on the development of machine learning algorithms for spiking neural networks, with an emphasis on local three-factor learning rules that are in keeping with the constraints imposed by current neuromorphic hardware. Spiking neural networks (SNNs) are an alternative to artificial neural networks (ANNs) that follow a similar graphical structure but use a processing paradigm more closely modeled after the biological brain in an effort to harness its low power processing capability. SNNs use an event based processing scheme which leads to significant power savings when implemented in dedicated neuromorphic hardware such as Intel’s Loihi chip.

This work …

Effect Of Process Control Agents Used In Mechanochemical Synthesis On Properties Of The Prepared Composite Reactive Materials, Mehnaz Mursalat

Dissertations

The study explores synthesis and reactivity of new reactive materials prepared by ball milling. High-energy ball milling became a ubiquitous mechano-chemical tool to manufacture diverse powders, from pharmaceuticals or foods to alloys to new solid rocket propellants. It enabled a dramatic expansion of the range of chemical compositions obtainable; however, it did not so far, allowed one to fine-tune morphology or interfaces in the generated powders. It is shown in this work how different process control agents (PCAs) can serve to tune the powder morphology and reactivity. Commonly used as lubricants and cooling agents during milling, liquid PCAs can be …

Understanding The Interfacial Processes Of Reactive Nanobubbles Toward Agricultural Applications, Xiaonan Shi

Dissertations

There is a growing interest in nanobubble (NB) technology because of its diverse applications (e.g., detergent-free cleaning, water aeration, ultra-sound imaging and intracellular drug delivery, and mineral processing). NBs have a higher efficiency of mass transfer compared to bulk scale bubbles due to the high specific surface areas. The high specific surface also facilitates physical adsorption and chemical reactions in the gas liquid interface. Furthermore, the collapse of NBs creates shock waves and the formation of hydroxyl radicals (OH).

However, it remains elusive why or how NBs are stabilized in water and particularly, the states of internal pressures of NBs …

Outdoor Operations Of Multiple Quadrotors In Windy Environment, Deepan Lobo

Dissertations

Coordinated multiple small unmanned aerial vehicles (sUAVs) offer several advantages over a single sUAV platform. These advantages include improved task efficiency, reduced task completion time, improved fault tolerance, and higher task flexibility. However, their deployment in an outdoor environment is challenging due to the presence of wind gusts. The coordinated motion of a multi-sUAV system in the presence of wind disturbances is a challenging problem when considering collision avoidance (safety), scalability, and communication connectivity. Performing wind-agnostic motion planning for sUAVs may produce a sizeable cross-track error if the wind on the planned route leads to actuator saturation. In a multi-sUAV …

Nystrom Methods For High-Order Cq Solutions Of The Wave Equation In Two Dimensions, Erli Wind-Andersen

Dissertations

An investigation of high order Convolution Quadratures (CQ) methods for the solution of the wave equation in unbounded domains in two dimensions is presented. These rely on Nystrom discretizations for the solution of the ensemble of associated Laplace domain modified Helmholtz problems. Two classes of CQ discretizations are considered: one based on linear multistep methods and the other based on Runge-Kutta methods. Both are used in conjunction with Nystrom discretizations based on Alpert and QBX quadratures of Boundary Integral Equation (BIE) formulations of the Laplace domain Helmholtz problems with complex wavenumbers. CQ in conjunction with BIE is an excellent candidate …