Engineering Commons^™

Coastal: Crowdsourcing Reports Of Phenomena On The Santa Cruz Coast, Will Maddrey, Daniel Schott, Michael Zetino

Computer Science and Engineering Senior Theses

Every day, beachgoers witness important environmental phenomena that go completely undocumented. Huge amounts of potential data that could be used for research are lost because people don’t have the means to report them, or simply don’t understand their significance. Additionally, many of these phenomena are potentially harmful, and are relatively unknown to the public. In this paper, we develop an iOS and Android mobile app called Coastal, with the goal of crowdsourcing reports of phenomena on the Santa Cruz coast. We hope that in the future, applications like Coastal can be used for both collecting data for environmental research, and …

Dominican Republic Greenhouse Automation, Ryan Le, Erik Mitchell, Mark Castillo

Computer Science and Engineering Senior Theses

The Dominican Republic's Instituto Politécnico Loyola (IPL) needs a wirelessly connected network of sensors for their greenhouses. Our project uses long-range (LoRa) communication to receive data from sensors within the greenhouse on the recorded temperature, humidity, soil moisture, and light values; stores and organizes these measurements in a database and backup text file; and displays appropriate recordings on an interactive application. We collaborated with a team of two General Engineering majors, with our focus on data retrieval and display functionality. Aside from basic data senders used solely for testing purposes, our final design serves as a central hub remotely accessible …

Film Viability Evaluator, Caitlin Lopez, Kulsoom Sabit

Computer Science and Engineering Senior Theses

Filmmaking is a financially high-risk field of work. There are multiple variables that contribute to a movie’s success or failure, however the most impactful ones have yet to be identified. In this paper, we used publicly available datasets in combination with several forms of analysis models to determine common factors associated with historically successful movies. Our results narrowed the top categories to include the runtime, the production budget, the release year, the genres, and the primary language. The final round of analysis yielded an 84% accuracy, after the usage of XGBoosting and gradient boosting. Further improvements to this project could …

Monster Maker, Harrison Bui

Computer Science and Engineering Senior Theses

3D modeling and rigging are necessary steps when it comes to 3D animation. However, not everyone has the time and patience to learn and practice these skills. Monster Maker provides an accessible way to create creatures from their imaginations by assembling pre-made 3D body parts. The option to dynamically alter the skeleton and modify body parts opens the door to hundreds of thousands of monsters each with their own unique design. Future developments of Monster Maker could provide users with options to control specific sub-components of the currently established body parts while also providing a more appealing UI.

Nutrition Visualization For Mindfulness, Jake Tsuchiyama, Jarin Simon, Landis Fusato, Ryan Wong

Computer Science and Engineering Senior Theses

In today’s world, users face multiple obstacles obtaining relevant nutrition information for the foods they consume. While nutrition information is provided on some foods like a standard candy bar, this label is typically hard to read and inconveniently located. For other foods such as an apple, this nutrition label is not provided at all and the burden is placed on the user to go out and find this information themselves. We hope to address this inaccessibility of nutrition information to help users ultimately make more informed decisions about their eating habits.

Immersive Scu Campus Tour With Augmented Reality, Tristan Limawan, Axel Perales, Alfredo Perry

Computer Science and Engineering Senior Theses

Santa Clara University has hosted numerous guided campus tours as a way for students to understand better and immerse themselves in the university's culture and environment. However, group sizes for these tours are limited and may fill up quickly, leaving students to compete for these tour slots. As such, accompanied by the continual growth in admissions reaching new highs each year, the situation presents a great need to help first-year and prospective students navigate the campus grounds and understand and learn about the campus history and culture.

To resolve this problem, we have developed an augmented reality web application allowing …

A Submodular Optimization Framework For Imbalanced Text Classification With Data Augmentation, Eyor Alemayehu

Engineering Ph.D. Theses

In the domain of text classification, imbalanced datasets are a common occurrence. The skewed distribution of the labels of these datasets poses a great challenge to the performance of text classifiers. One popular way to mitigate this challenge is to augment underwhelmingly represented labels with synthesized items. The synthesized items are generated by data augmentation methods that can typically generate an unbounded number of items. To select the synthesized items that maximize the performance of text classifiers, we introduce a novel method that selects items that jointly maximize the likelihood of the items belonging to their respective labels and the …

Low Power Tinyml For Image Recognition, Robb Chun, Anonna Hasan

Electrical and Computer Engineering Senior Theses

TinyML is a rapidly developing field of machine learning that focuses on deploying complex neural networks on to edge devices such as microcontrollers and phones. The goal of this project is to train and deploy an image classification neural network on top of a Raspberry Pi Pico4ML that can be used in an application to assist the visually impaired. In this project, we will use the TensorflowLite for Microcontrollers platform in order to train and convert a convolutional neural network from Keras into a lightweight tflite model that can be deployed to the Pico4ML. Our tasks include training the image …

Embride: A Madhubani Art Creator, Jui Banik

Computer Science and Engineering Master's Theses

Creative machines are playing an increasingly important role in the art world and society at large. This gives rise to the need to consider the ethical dimensions of artistic machine agents. Whose art are we amplifying, or more importantly, who is being left behind? Computational Creativity offers the opportunity to bring awareness and visibility to art forms that have been systemically suppressed due to a range of longstanding societal biases. In this paper, we introduce EMBRIDE, a system that creates Madhubani art, practiced by women in the villages of India and Nepal. We hope that this work will encourage further …

Lever Drive Wheelchair With Gear-Changing Concept, Dylan Hsu, Julian Hermosura, Anugrah Murali, Brian Burke

Interdisciplinary Design Senior Theses

The team has taken notice of the limitations disabled people in wheelchairs experience in everyday life due to the insufficiencies of their wheelchairs. The purpose of this project is to create a wheelchair that is affordable for users and enables them to have more freedom when it comes to their areas of travel. Our wheelchair would allow patients to be more integrated into society by not only having more freedom in the areas that they can travel, but also to be a part of the economic society by potentially providing services to people with their updated mode of transport.

The …

Santa Clara Radio Astronomy Project Ii (Scrap Ii), Logan Barnes, Michael Quang, Aria Rouzmehr

Electrical and Computer Engineering Senior Theses

The Santa Clara Radio Astronomy Program (SCRAP II) is the continuation of the previous year’s radio astronomy project. Building off of last year’s proof-of-concept, the goal of this project is to design and build a parabolic radio telescope that will boast improved antenna performance, more efficient data acquisition, and cleaner post-processing. These improvements in design strive toward a larger goal of enabling the students of Santa Clara University to explore the depths of our universe from Earth. In this paper, we improve upon a horn antenna design that was used in the previous year with a parabolic antenna. This, combined …

Microgrid Control System, Sofia Brumbaugh, Nathan Kehl

Electrical and Computer Engineering Senior Theses

As a result of many factors, microgrids are an emerging technology in today’s world, gaining popularity all over the globe. Each microgrid requires a controller that makes sure the microgrid functions properly. In this paper, we will design and simulate a controller which consists of primary and secondary control, and is able to disconnect, stabilize and reconnect the microgrid to the main grid in accordance with IEEE Standard 1547. We first tested our design in Simulink, then with OPAL-RT, and see that it meets all our requirements. By looking at the successful results we obtained, it is proven the controller …

Open Source Implementation Of Cortex M0, Sean Shao, Devin Hill

Electrical and Computer Engineering Senior Theses

The Cortex-M series is an immensely popular family of processors optimized for low cost, size, and power. The smallest of the M-family, the Cortex-M0, uses a 3-stage pipelined design. Despite their popularity, however, no publicly available open-source designs exist for the Cortex-M series. Thus, for our senior design project, we chose to create an open-source implementation of the Cortex-M0 processor in Verilog. This enables users to learn more about, experiment on, and make changes to the design of the processor.

Though our goal for this project was to support all the functionality of the Cortex-M0 processor (as defined in the …

Microneedles For Wound Healing, Maya Matheny, Maggie Dubus, Lily Eribes

Bioengineering Senior Theses

Microneedles are a virtually painless and minimally invasive transdermal delivery system comprised of an array of micron-sized needles that can be used to deliver cells, drugs, proteins, and vaccines. However, a major challenge to this delivery method is controlling puncture depth. To advance the microneedle landscape, our project aims to identify and characterize the biomechanical cues between a microneedle puncture and a hydrogel skin phantom for pre-clinical testing A stopper microneedle design that controlled puncture depth into the phantom skin model patch to 150μm was tested on millimeter-thick mold-casted alginate slabs. The hysteresis loop differs in the presence and absence …

Acat 2.0: An Ai Transformer-Based Approach To Predictive Speech Generation, Kairan Quazi

Computer Science and Engineering Senior Theses

While constituting a rare family of diseases that afflicts 268,000 people worldwide, motor neuron diseases carry a high fatality rate with one-third of people dying within a year of diagnosis and 50% of people dying within two years (MND Association, 2022). MNDs rapidly and progressively impair muscle movement, making everyday activities like walking, chewing, and speaking almost impossible. In collaboration with famed physicist Dr. Stephen Hawking, Intel Labs developed an assistive communications platform known as ACAT to simulate speech and facilitate electronic tasks. However, the original ACAT can be slow to use, leading to awkward pauses in conversations. This paper …

Engineering News, Spring 2023, School Of Engineering

Engineering News

No abstract provided.

Reactive Particle Swarm Control Architecture And Application For Scalar Field Adaptive Navigation, Shae Taylor Hart

Engineering Ph.D. Theses

Adaptive navigation is a subcategory of navigation techniques that attempts to identify goal locations that satisfy specific criteria in an unknown area. In 2D scalar field adaptive navigation (SFAN), primitives navigate to or along features of interest in an unknown, possibly time-varying, planar scalar field. Features include extrema, contours, and fronts. This work solves the 2D SFAN problem using swarm robotic techniques. Robotic swarms are a subset of multi-robot systems that use decentralized control of simple interchangeable robots to perform collective actions. A subgroup of swarms is the Reactive Particle Swarm (RPS), characterized based on its simplicity, reactivity to its …

Soft Shell Helmet Cover, Jo Espiritu, Caleb Chiang, Jay Laborin, Serry Srouji, Mathew Franke

Mechanical Engineering Senior Theses

Lattice structures usage for attenuation is growing in popularity as 3D printing methods allow for the easier production of complex structures. The application of these impact attenuators allows for wider applications that can lead to better products in sports such as football to prevent head trauma. In this paper, we aim to design and test lattice structures to determine a lattice model that best prevents impacts through drop and compression testing to provide an outer layer of protection for football players. Initial validity through finite element analysis provided four potential lattice structures with a single parameter. Physical testing determined the …

Project Hermes: The Socially Assistive Tour-Guiding Robot, Aly Khater, Justin Sun, Fernando Camou

Electrical and Computer Engineering Senior Theses

With the reduced amount of availability of a labor force for non-technical tasks, service robotics has grown to be used in place of human labor to handle these tasks. There have been various studies on the impact of using robotics in a sociological context. The use of service robots in a social and labor environment recognizes the need of cohesive Human-Robot Interaction (HRI). In this senior design project, we delve into the thought process of using a service robot in place of a human for tasks that are normally reserved for humans. These tasks outline design considerations when performing emotional-centric …

Pedestrian Bridge For Discovery & Innovation, Matthew Hale, Dylan Stegman, Jake Porter

Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Senior Theses

A new pedestrian bridge was designed adjacent to the Children’s Discovery Museum of San Jose spanning across the Guadalupe River in the Downtown San Jose area. This design includes structural, geotechnical, and construction components. The architectural aspects of the bridge include two intertwined mass timber arches, galvanized steel cables, and a deck consisting of wide flange I-beams and a proprietary structural glass deck system. These features allow the bridge to seamlessly integrate into the surrounding environment as well as expose structural components of a pedestrian bridge that would otherwise be covered by a traditional bridge deck. All disciplinary components of …

Mclaughlin-Walsh Residence Hall Expansion, Rebecca Huang, Shanelle Smith

Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Senior Theses

An expansion of McLaughlin-Walsh Residence at Santa Clara University was designed to provide additional housing accommodations to on-campus residents. The design included both the structural and geotechnical components. The proposed solution included a vertical expansion of the residence hall with the design of a podium to span over the existing structure to support an additional residential structure. The loads of the additional residential structure were estimated to complete the design of the podium structure. The podium was designed to support the estimated loads using reinforced concrete columns, steel beams, prefabricated trusses, and concrete on metal deck. The podium design was …

Sustainable, Environmental Transit Hub (Seth) In Kapolei, Hawai‘I, Rebecca Ridao, Azi Nigmatullin, Andrew Ruiz, Matthew Flores

Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Senior Theses

In this report, a detailed design of a Sustainable, Environmental Transit Hub is provided that has the potential to mitigate the overbearing traffic congestion problem on the primary highways of O‘ahu, Hawai‘i. The report will consist of a brief description on why the team considered reviewing this issue with an explanation of the problem statement followed by an alternative analysis breakdown, constraints and criteria list, chosen solution with the inclusion of the location, the team’s respective scopes of work, codes and regulations that were followed, ethical considerations, design specifications, and references that were used for information. The primary scopes that …

Sustainable Design Of Reinforced Concrete Beam, Justin Lei, Alyssa Quezada, Juan Ramirez-Daza

Civil, Environmental and Sustainable Engineering Senior Theses

The need for sustainable methods of construction is continuously rising as heavily populated areas are growing in size and the demand for new construction is expanding. This project aims to identify typical environmental damages associated with the construction of a typical mixed-use building in San Jose, CA, specifically the emissions of greenhouse gasses; carbon dioxide. The project also aims to meet current design standards and requirements set by the American Concrete Institution and the California Building Code to ensure the safety of all users. Lastly, to ensure the design can be implemented in the field, a cost analysis of the …

Nautilus Rov Robot Manipulator, Dana Stefanides, Jenny Huynh, Andrew Stewart, Steven Reimer, Andrew Nguyen, Rebecca Walters, Matt Hayes

Interdisciplinary Design Senior Theses

Global warming and climate change are prevalent issues in today’s society. As a result, research in the ocean, our world’s biggest ecosystem, is imperative in efforts to protect the environment. Santa Clara University’s Robotic Systems Lab contributes to this field through work and developments on remotely operated vehicles (ROVs). An existing ROV system called Nautilus consists of a robot arm, end effector, and storage system in order to collect various types of sediments at a depth of 300 feet. However, the previous system does not meet that requirement. In direct collaboration with researchers within the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, …

Robotic Arm Extrusion End Effector, Nicholas Viamin, David Blouin, Savannah Hunt, Nico Figueroa

Interdisciplinary Design Senior Theses

This senior design project aims to enhance the capabilities of the Rotrics AIO Desktop Arm (Dexarm) by designing and implementing an extrusion device capable of smooth and consistent extrusion for 3D printing applications. The project focused on ensuring safety, affordability, and ease-of-use for users, while achieving precise control over the extrusion process. Various mechanical and electrical components were carefully selected to ensure compatibility with the Dexarm and to provide optimal performance. To maintain safety, extensive testing and risk assessments were conducted to minimize any potential hazards associated with the extrusion process. To achieve smooth and consistent extrusion, precise control mechanisms …

Dominican Republic Greenhouse Automation, Pedro Alvarenga, Henry Kayser

Interdisciplinary Design Senior Theses

The development process involved meticulous engineering and integration of the electrical components, ensuring seamless functionality and performance. The AGS was designed to be affordable, scalable, and easily replicable, with the intention of expanding its implementation beyond the DR to other underserved communities globally. By optimizing resource management, conserving energy, and minimizing the carbon footprint, the AGS promotes environmental sustainability in food production. Overall, this senior design capstone project successfully developed a cost-effective and user-friendly Automated Greenhouse System, addressing food insecurity challenges in the DR. The project demonstrated professional excellence, fulfilled the mission of SCU's School of Engineering, and strengthened the …

Neurogen: Eeg And Near-Infrared Light Stimulation Control System, Arnold Nieto, Jaylinn Solis, Matthew Tamanaha

Interdisciplinary Design Senior Theses

Light stimulation or transcranial photobiomodulation (tPBM) therapy has been shown to be effective when treating patients suffering neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease. While there is currently no cure, light stimulation can help alleviate symptoms for those patient’s suffering from these diseases. With this in mind, the senior design team from last year began a prototype hybrid electroencephalography (EEG) and tPBM device. They implemented a specific wavelength of 810 nanometer (nm) near-infrared (NIR) light emitting diodes (LEDs), with a 16 channel EEG headset from OpenBCI. The device was intended to serve as a potential research tool, with a …

Inter-Abled And Adaptable Arcade Controls And Cabinet, Emma Berry, Raquel Macias

Electrical and Computer Engineering Senior Theses

A considerable void exists in the digital gaming space, with a distinct lack of feasible control solutions for disabled gamers. The project aims to bridge this gap via a proof-of-concept arcade machine with interchangeable control surfaces, each catering to a different physical disability. In particular, the control boards aim to address the lack of accessibility of individuals with arthritis, as well as those with the use of only a single arm. To such an end, we design and implement STM32-based controllers which connect and interact directly with the host computer. Despite technical hardships, our results show that comprehensive control solutions …

Theia: The Handheld Eye-Tracking Interface For All, Christian Garcia, Edward Ghazarossian, Pranav Grover

Electrical and Computer Engineering Senior Theses

Eye tracking is a burgeoning technology that has found applications in market research, accessibility, and as an add-on to games. However, this technology still has room to grow in the consumer space, where touchscreens, keyboards, and mice dominate our interactions with technology. Interfaces that are primarily controlled using eye tracking are less common, and are not found in a handheld form factor. This paper explores the possibility of creating a handheld device that is primarily controlled using eye tracking. Our proposed system performs real-time filtering on eye tracking inputs in order to improve the accuracy and usability of the device. …

Biomimicry In Solar Energy Applications, Terrin Cramer, Yicheng Kang, Ryan Ogino

Electrical and Computer Engineering Senior Theses

While solar power is one of the leading renewable energy sources today, current solar farms produce an amount of byproduct heat that is contributing to rising global temperatures and the deaths of many birds. Furthermore, solar panels that use water as a coolant through a sprinkler system use up a great amount of water that could be allocated somewhere else. Our project seeks to address both of these issues through a biomimetic design. Drawing inspiration from the ghost plant, our proposed solar panel cooling system is expected to reduce the amount of byproduct heat produced by panels, increase the overall …