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Be Makes High Impact On 2016 Annual Ibe Conference | Biological Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

The BE Department made a high positive impact at the 2016 International Annual Conference of theInstitute of Biological Engineering, which was held in Greenville, South Carolina, from April 7 through 9. BE was represented by ten students and six faculty members. PhD student Anna Doloman received an award (3rd place) for her research poster “Microbial Dynamics During Anaerobic Digestion of Algae Biomass and Sodium Acetate in an Upflow Anaerobic Sludge Blanket Reactor.”

Rethinking Stormwater: Usu Researchers Receive Major Grant To Study Aquifer Recharge | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

April 20, 2016 – Researchers at Utah State University are taking a fresh look at stormwater management as part of a federally-funded study to improve water reuse in the western U.S.

The team of engineers, scientists and sociologists are among a growing group of water quality experts who say it’s time for new ideas in stormwater management. Their research proposal was chosen among five nationwide to receive part of an Environmental Protection Agency grant totaling $3.3 million. USU will receive $774,283.

Nasa Selects Usu Engineering Team For Small Rocket Motor Research | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

April 18, 2016 – Aerospace engineering students at Utah State University are leading exciting new research into the future of small rocket motors. The team of undergraduate students, led by Professor Tony Whitmore, will get a $200,000 NASA grant to better understand how a new generation of “green” rocket motors could help revolutionize the space industry.

Gas Gap Conductance Between Ht9 And Ss316, Michael Luke Scoggins, Chris Martinez

Student Research Symposium

Inside a nuclear reactor, it is important to understand in detail the heat transfer between surfaces. This research aims to ensure the safety of new fuel experiments in the Idaho National Laboratory test reactor by studying the thermal properties of stainless steel and high temperature steel surfaces with a microscopic gas gap between them. The complex behavior of the gas requires a combination of experimental and theoretical modeling. A technique called laser flash analysis is being applied to calculate the effective thermal conductivity of the metal-gas-metal composite sample. From there, gap conductance is calculated using the other known physical parameters …

Camp: An Algorithm To Recover Sparse Signals With Unknown Clustering Pattern Using Approximate Message Passing, Mohammad Shekaramiz, Todd K. Moon, Jacob H. Gunther

Student Research Symposium

Recovering clustered sparse signals with an unknown sparsity pattern for the single measurement vector (SMV) problems is considered. The notion of sparsity in this context is referred to the signals having very few non-zero elements in some known basis. In the SMV, the objective is to recover a sparse or compressible signal from a small set of linear non-adaptive measurements. The case considered in this paper is that the signal of interest is not only sparse but also has an unknown clustered pattern, which occurs in many practical situations. In this case, we propose a sparse Bayesian learning algorithm simplified …

Arakniprint: 3d Printing Of Synthetic Spider Silk To Produce Biocompatible And Resorbable Biomaterials, Ashley Ruben, Brianne Bell, Chase Spencer, Craig Soelberg, Dan Gil, Thomas Harris, Richard Decker, Timothy A. Taylor, Randolph V. Lewis

Student Research Symposium

At $3.07 billion in 2013, the 3D printing industry was projected to reach $12.8 billion in 2018 and exceed $21 billion by 2020 (Wohlers and Caffrey, 2013). A lucrative part of this expanding industry includes printing biocompatible medical implants, devices, and tissue scaffolds. A common problem encountered with traditional devices, implants, and tissue scaffolds is that they are not unique to the patient and lack the necessary strength and biocompatibility. To answer these demands, customizable devices are being produced from patient medical scans and CAD designs using 3D printers. These printers traditionally use thermoplastics because of the ease with which …

Online Dissemination Of Official Information - The 2014 Carlton Complex Wildfires, Apoorva Chauhan

Student Research Symposium

Using the 2014 Carlton Complex wildfires as a case study, we explore how emergency responders and the news media shared official information online during this crisis event. We first identified the local emergency response and news media agencies for this event and then collected data from each agency’s Facebook account, Twitter account, and website. The data show that most of the online information about this event came from the local agencies handling the event. The data also show that in most cases, event updates were first reported online by the local news media of the affected cities and communities. We …

Secretion Of Bioplastic Polymers From Methanotrophic Bacteria Grown Using Natural Gas, Chad L. Nielsen, Charles D. Miller

Student Research Symposium

Biodegradable bioplastics show promise as a replacement for traditional plastics. Cost of production due to the cost of feedstocks and separation/purification processes are the main obstacles to widespread use of bioplastics. The possibility of reducing these costs through using methane gas as a feedstock and genetically transforming a methanotrophic bacterium to secrete bioplastics was investigated through experimentation. The bacteria are a promising option for bioplastic production.

Shear Testing Of Precast Concrete Sandwich Wall Panel Composite Shear Connectors, Taylor Sorensen, Jaiden Olsen, Marc Maguire

Student Research Symposium

As energy codes become more stringent, thermal efficiency of Precast Concrete Sandwich Panel Walls has become more important. This paper addresses the problem of predicting the behavior of full scale precast concrete sandwich panel walls, using data collected from small, inexpensive push-off specimens. Several fiber reinforced polymer (FRP) connectors being used today underwent shear testing performed on component scale push-off specimens. Each specimen contained several of the FRP connectors and the variables studied were wythe thickness, insulation type and insulation bond. A simplified beam spring model was created which uses beams to represent the concrete wythes and shear springs to …

Sparse Recovery With Unknown Sparsity Pattern Via Multiple Measurement Vectors, Mohammad Shekaramiz, Todd K. Moon, Jacob H. Gunther

Student Research Symposium

In this work, we investigate finding the supports of sparse signals via multiple measurement vectors (MMVs). MMV can be thought as a collection of single measurement vectors (SMVs), in which all the SMVs share the same sparsity pattern, referred to as joint sparsity in the literature. The term sparse is referred to the signals that have very few non-zero (active) elements. The SMV problem is essentially a computational problem related to compressive sensing (CS) with the core idea of providing the possibility of measuring and representing a sparse or compressible signal from a small set of non-adaptive linear measurements. Here, …

Remembering Mae Professor Emeritus Edward Vendell | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

April 13, 2016 — Faculty, students and staff members at USU's College of Engineering shared their sympathies in learning of the passing of Mechanical Engineering Professor Emeritus Dr. Edward Vendell. Dr. Vendell died Saturday April 9. He was 83.

Potential Effects Of Climate Change On Ecologically Relevant Streamflow Regimes, Sulochan Dhungel, David G. Tarboton, Jiming Jin, Charles P. Hawkins

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

We assessed the climate-driven changes in ecologically relevant flow regimes expected to occur by the year 2100 in streams across the conterminous United States. We used long-term daily flow measurements from 601 gauged streams whose watersheds were in relatively natural condition to characterize spatial variation in 16 flow regime variables selected for their ecological importance. Principal component analysis of these 16 variables produced five uncorrelated factors that described patterns of spatial covariation in flow regimes. These five factors were associated with low flow, magnitude, flashiness, timing, and constancy characteristics of the daily flow regime. We applied hierarchical clustering to the …

Dr. Idalis Villanueva Highlighted In Utah State University's Undergraduate Teaching Fellow's Blog | Eed, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

Dr. Idalis Villanueva is a professor in the College of Engineering at Utah State University. She is a faculty mentor for the UTF program. Below, she describes her experience with the UTF program and why she believes it is helping students elevate their education. Enjoy!

Channel Movement, Error Analysis, And Impacts For Neighboring Landowners: A Lower Bear River, Ut Case Study, Russell Babb, Kellie Shawn, Todd Brown, Ayman Alafifi, David Rosenberg

Spring Runoff Conference

The Bear River Fellows program is a unique learning experience for undergraduate students giving hands-on experience in collecting, synthesizing, and analyzing environmental and ecological data. The Bear River is an important resource that provides water to farms, reservoirs, wetlands, wildlife, and hydropower generation. Because of the river’s value, it is important to understand how the Bear River channel moves and how that affects the surrounding landscape, which is a topic of interest for local land owners but especially conservationists in protecting wetlands and river ecology. We collected hydrological, topologic, and vegetative data from three persisting research sites along an 8 …

Seasonal Flow Rates Along The Lower Bear River, Ut, Todd Keniry, Dahlia Curiel, Dylan Anderson, Ayman Alafifi, David E. Rosenberg

Spring Runoff Conference

The goal of this research is to identify how flow on the Bear River in Cache Valley has changed over the last three years and how flow changes seasonally. Identifying flows is important to manage water resources along the Bear River. We collected and processed water pressure data every 30 minutes using HOBO transducers at two sites in Cache Valley (Morton, just downstream of highway 142, and Confluence which is located at the confluence of the Bear and Cub Rivers) south of the Idaho‐Utah border in 2015. We also measured flow and water stage up to three times per year …

Aggie Engineers Receive Nsf Graduate Research Fellowships | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

April 1, 2016 – A Utah State University Aggie from the College of Engineering has been selected to receive the prestigious National Science Foundation Fellowship Award that will help cover the costs of graduate studies. A second engineering alumnus also received the award.

Ag Nanoparticles Generated Using Bio-Reduction And –Coating Cause Microbial Killing Without Cell Lysis, Gade A. Adams, Joan E. Mclean, J. Adams, D. W. Britt, Fenann Shen, A. Jacobson, Y. C. Kim

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

Cost-effective “green” methods of producing Ag nanoparticles (NPs) are being examined because of the potential of these NPs as antimicrobials. Ag NPs were generated from Ag ions using extracellular metabolites from a soil-borne Pythium species. The NPs were variable in size, but had one dimension less than 50 nm and were biocoated; aggregation and coating changed with acetone precipitation. They had dose-dependent lethal effects on a soil pseudomonad, Pseudomonas chlororaphis O6, and were about 30-fold more effective than Ag+ ions. A role of reactive oxygen species in cell death was demonstrated by use of fluorescent dyes responsive to superoxide anion …

Automatic Surface Crack Detection In Concrete Structures Using Otsu Thresholding And Morphological Operations, Sattar Dorafshan, Marc Maguire, Xiaojun Qi

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

Concrete cracking is a ubiquitous phenomenon, present in all types of concrete structures. Identifying and tracking the amount and severity of cracking is paramount to evaluating the current condition and predicting the future service life of a concrete asset. Concrete cracks can indicate reinforcement corrosion, the development of spalls or changing support conditions. Therefore, monitoring cracks during the life span of concrete structures has been an effective technique to evaluate the level of safety and preparing plans for future appropriate rehabilitation.

One growing technique are unmanned inspections using Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV). UAVs are drones equipped with cameras, sensors, GPS, …

Congratulations A-Pin Recipients | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

March 29, 2016 – Dean Christine Hailey and department heads from across the College of Engineering on Tuesday recognized 13 students for receiving the prestigious A-Pin award.

The A-Pin is one of the oldest awards at Utah State University. Initiated in 1910, it acknowledges and rewards students who achieve a straight-A grade point average while carrying 15 graded credit hours for two consecutive semesters.

Student From Reu Project Wins Presentation At Emerging Researchers National Conference | Engineering Education, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

A student from last year’s REU project, Bethany Fronhofer, attended the 2016 Emerging Researchers National (ERN) Conference. Where she spoke about the work that she did along with Sarah Schott in Dr. Idalis Villanueva’s lab. Bethany’s presentation won first place for the Science and Mathematics Education/Social and Behavioral Sciences Undergraduate Oral Presentation category.

Differences In Nutrient And Metal Uptake Among Plant Species In Stormwater Bioretention Systems., M. R. Borecki, Ryan Dupont, Joan E. Mclean

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

An Overview Of Current Applications, Challenges, And Future Trends In Distributed Process-Based Models In Hydrology, Simone Fatichi, Enrique R. Vivoni, Fred L. Ogden, Valeriy Y. Ivanov, Benjamin Mirus, David Gochis, Charles W. Downer, Matteo Camporese, Jason H. Davison, Brian Ebel, Norm Jones, Jongho Kim, Giuseppe Mascaro, Richard Niswonger, Pedro Restrepo, Riccardo Rigon, Chaopeng Shen, Mauro Sulis, David G. Tarboton

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

Process-based hydrological models have a long history dating back to the 1960s. Criticized by some as over-parameterized, overly complex, and difficult to use, a more nuanced view is that these tools are necessary in many situations and, in a certain class of problems, they are the most appropriate type of hydrological model. This is especially the case in situations where knowledge of flow paths or distributed state variables and/or preservation of physical constraints is important. Examples of this include: spatiotemporal variability of soil moisture, groundwater flow and runoff generation, sediment and contaminant transport, or when feedbacks among various Earth’s system …

The Use Of Microfluidics And Dielectrophoresis For Separation, Concentration, And Identification Of Bacteria, Cynthia Hanson, Michael Sieverts, Karen Tew, Annelise Dykes, Michaela Salisbury, Elizabeth Vargis

Biological Engineering Faculty Publications

Traditional bacterial identification methods take one to two days to complete, relying on large bacteria colonies for visual identification. In order to decrease this analysis time in a cost-effective manner, a method to sort and concentrate bacteria based on the bacteria's characteristics itself is needed. One example of such a method is dielectrophoresis, which has been used by researchers to separate bacteria from sample debris and sort bacteria according to species. This work presents variations in which dielectrophoresis can be performed and their associated drawbacks and benefits specifically to bacterial identification. In addition, a potential microfluidic design will be discussed.

Prada: Combating Voltage Noise In The Noc Power Supply Through Flow-Control And Routing Algorithms., Prabal Basu, Rajesh Jayashankarashridevi, Koushik Chakraborty, Sanghamitra Roy

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Network-on-Chip (NoC) has become the de-facto standard for on-chip communication in MPSoCs. The growing NoC power footprint, increase in the transistor current, and high switching speed of the logic devices, exacerbate the peak power supply noise (PSN) in the NoC power delivery network (PDN). Hence, preserving power supply integrity in the NoC PDN is critical. In this work, we propose PRADA (PSN-aware Runtime Adaptation)-a collection of a novel flow-control protocol (PAF) and an adaptive routing algorithm (PAR), to mitigate PSN in NoCs. Our best scheme achieves 14% and 12% improvements in the regional peak PSN and energy efficiency, with an …

Winning The Water War Starts With Winning The Battle On Data | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

March 3, 2016 – The water meter buried in your front yard isn’t exactly the most cutting-edge piece of technology. While they are accurate, most residential water meters are read only once per month, resulting in rough usage data – often rounded to the nearest 1,000 gallons. With the limited data, water utility managers can’t distinguish individual uses, such as sprinklers versus toilets, or determine usage by time of day. This limits their ability to spot costly leaks or see opportunities for water conservation. And it gives water users no useful information about how and when they use water.

Spring Runoff Conference 2016 - Call For Abstracts | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

March 2, 2016 — Utah State University’s Spring Runoff Conference is just weeks away. The annual spring runoff conference brings together researchers, scientists, and top experts in Utah and Intermountain West to discuss water issues. This year’s conference will take place April 5-6, 2016 at the Eccles Conference Center on USU’s Logan campus.

Civil And Environmental Student Wins Award At National Agu Conference | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

Feb. 29, 2016 – Tyler King, a PhD student in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Utah StateUniversity, received an outstanding student paper award in hydrology at the fall meeting of the American Geophysical Union.

Senior Alumni And Industry Luncheon 2016 | Biological Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

The 3rd Annual Senior, Alumni, & Industry Luncheon (SAIL) will be on Friday, March 25, 2016 in room 326 of the Engineering Building (ENGR) at 11:30 AM.

Applications For Elections | Electrical And Computer Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

Elections are upon us! The USU student chapter of IEEE is run by volunteer students, and we're glad to have you participate with us. Consider the positions that will be available for this coming election and how you can contribute.

The positions of Chair and Vice Chair will be decided based on votes from the entire electrical engineering department. The runner up will be the Vice Chair. The elected Chair and Vice Char will then review the applications for other positions.

Usu Biological Engineer Patents Method To Make Natural Blue Dye | College Of Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

Feb. 22, 2016 – A Utah State University researcher has taken a big step toward making a safer, more natural dye that can be used in the food, textile, cosmetic and other industries.

Dr. Jixun Zhan, an associate professor of biological engineering at USU, has secured a patent for an innovative method to produce the deep blue dye known as indigoidine. The tint was originally synthesized from a bacterial strain found inRhode Island and offered a promising alternative to the synthetic dyes used to color jeans, leather, food and paper.