Engineering Commons^™

Incorporating Evidence-Based Teaching Practices In A Civil/Environmental Engineering Course To Improve Learning, Julie Anne Wildschut

University Faculty Publications and Creative Works

The most important goal of teaching is student learning, passing on information from the instructor to the student so they can apply those concepts and skills months and years after instruction. However, this goal is not easily accomplished. Thinking and learning take significant effort and students often resist putting in the required work. Additionally, the increasingly diverse student population and recent disruptions to traditional classroom learning require instructional design to meet learning outcomes. Three evidence-based teaching practices including retrieval practice, spaced (distributed) practice, and interleaving were incorporated into a hydraulics course to improve student learning and evaluated for their effectiveness. …

Data From: Active Transportation Counts From Existing On-Street Signal And Detection Infrastructure, Sirisha Kothuri, Patrick Allen Singleton, Mahyar Vahedi Saheli, Elizabeth Yates, Joseph P. Broach

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Datasets

This study’s objective was to use data from existing traffic signal infrastructure to estimate pedestrian volumes. Pedestrian push-button actuations were collected from signal controller logs at 49 intersections in western Oregon and an additional 16 intersections in eastern Oregon. These actuations were then compared to observed pedestrian counts, totaling over 34,000 people, obtained from video recordings. After exploring various options, a simple quadratic relationship was modeled using a single measure of pedestrian signal activity: the number of push-button presses (filtered to remove multiple presses within 15 seconds). The model’s predictions showed a correlation of 0.86 with observed pedestrian volumes and …

Developing An Assessment Model For Entrepreneurship Ecosystems Using Hierarchical Decision Model, Mustafa Almuzel, Tugrul U. Daim, Birol Yesilada, Marina Dabic, Gulin Idil Bolatan

Engineering and Technology Management Faculty Publications and Presentations

Entrepreneurship is a crucial driver of economic growth, necessitating the development of effective entrepreneurial ecosystems. However, there are significant gaps in the literature regarding the structured assessment of these ecosystems. This study addresses three main research gaps: the lack of structured evaluation methods, the need for a comprehensive analysis of ecosystem challenges from various perspectives, and the identification of critical factors essential for ecosystem growth. To bridge these gaps, the research introduces the Hierarchical Decision Model (HDM) as a universal assessment framework that can be adapted to different cities for creating effective entrepreneurial environments. The research methodology involved formulating perspectives …

Project Control System (Pcs) Implementation In Engineering And Construction Projects: An Empirical Study In Saudi's Petroleum And Chemical Industry, Sahar Jawad, Ann Ledwith, Rashid Khan

School of Cybersecurity Faculty Publications

Purpose

There is growing recognition that effective project control systems (PCS) are critical to the success of projects. The relationship between the individual elements of PCS and successfully achieving project objectives has yet to be explored. This research investigates the enablers and barriers that influence the elements of PCS success and drive project objectives.

Design/methodology/approach

This study adopts a mixed approach of descriptive analysis and regression models to explore the impact of six PCS elements on project outcomes. Petroleum and chemical projects in Saudi Arabia were selected as a case study to validate the research model.

Findings

Data from a …

Anonymous Attribute-Based Broadcast Encryption With Hidden Multiple Access Structures, Tran Viet Xuan Phuong

School of Cybersecurity Faculty Publications

Due to the high demands of data communication, the broadcasting system streams the data daily. This service not only sends out the message to the correct participant but also respects the security of the identity user. In addition, when delivered, all the information must be protected for the party who employs the broadcasting service. Currently, Attribute-Based Broadcast Encryption (ABBE) is useful to apply for the broadcasting service. (ABBE) is a combination of Attribute-Based Encryption (ABE) and Broadcast Encryption (BE), which allows a broadcaster (or encrypter) to broadcast an encrypted message, including a predefined user set and specified access policy to …

Robust Denoising And Densenet Classification Framework For Plant Disease Detection, Kevin Zhou, Dimah Dera

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Plant disease is one of many obstacles encountered in the field of agriculture. Machine learning models have been used to classify and detect diseases among plants by analyzing and extracting features from plant images. However, a common problem for many models is that they are trained on clean laboratory images and do not exemplify real conditions where noise can be present. In addition, the emergence of adversarial noise that can mislead models into wrong predictions poses a severe challenge to developing preserved models against noisy environments. In this paper, we propose an end-to-end robust plant disease detection framework that combines …

Responsive District Heating For A Sustainable Power Grid, Robin Zou, Sarah Robson, Denise A. Mckahn, Judith Cardell

Engineering: Faculty Publications

The electrification of energy use for building heating-cooling and transportation sectors increases stress on an already strained electric power grid. Shifting energy end-use to electricity presupposes that electricity generation is relatively clean in terms of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. With the legacy power system and significant operational constraints on the power grid though, the majority of electricity generation is now, and will continue for many years, to be predominantly powered from fossil fuel combustion. The continuing need to decrease carbon and other GHGs raises the need to find clean energy sources outside of the electric power grid.

One clean energy …

Root Water Uptake Patterns Are Controlled By Tree Species Interactions And Soil Water Variability, Gökben Demir, Andrew J. Guswa, Janett Filipzik, Johanna Clara Metzger, Christine Römermann, Anke Hildebrandt

Engineering: Faculty Publications

Root water uptake depends on soil moisture which is primarily fed by throughfall in forests. Several biotic and abiotic elements shape the spatial distribution of throughfall. It is well documented that throughfall patterns result in reoccurring higher and lower water inputs at certain locations. However, how the spatial distribution of throughfall affects root water uptake patterns remains unresolved. Therefore, we investigate root water uptake patterns by considering spatial patterns of throughfall and soil water in addition to soil and neighboring tree characteristics. In a beech-dominated mixed deciduous forest in a temperate climate, we conducted intensive throughfall sampling at locations paired …

Experimental And Modeled Assessment Of Interventions To Reduce Pm2.5 In A Residence During Awildfire Event, Chrissi Argyro Antonopoulos, H. E. Dillon, Elliott T. Gall

Mechanical and Materials Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Increasingly large and frequent wildfires affect air quality even indoors by emitting and dispersing fine/ultrafine particulate matter known to pose health risks to residents. With this health threat, we are working to help the building science community develop simplified tools that may be used to estimate impacts to large numbers of homes based on high-level housing characteristics. In addition to reviewing literature sources, we performed an experiment to evaluate interventions to mitigate degraded indoor air quality. We instrumented one residence for one week during an extreme wildfire event in the Pacific Northwest. Outdoor ambient concentrations of PM_2.5 reached historic …

Particle Accelerator Spin-Transparent Storage Rings For Beyond State-Of-The-Art Science, R. Suleiman, Y. Derbenev, M. Grau, V. Morozov

Physics Faculty Publications

We will describe spin-transparent storage rings that exhibit spin-coherence times of several hours and store a large number of particles and their use in novel applications. For example, these rings can be used to directly measure the electric dipole moment of the electron, relevant to CP violation and matter-antimatter asymmetry in the universe, and to search for dark energy and ultra-light dark matter*. These rings can also serve as a compelling platform for quantum computing. In this presentation, we will describe how spin-transparent rings can be used in conjunction with ion traps to enhance scalability and increase quantum coherence times …

Guardians Of The Catheters, Interprofessional Collaboration Reduced Cauti Rates At Phfh, Dawn Doud, Angela Shemwell, Stephanie Brown, Tobi Bryan, Georgia Gauron, Tasha Anisimov, Peter Weitzman, Emma Peterson, Tiffanie Rampley

Articles, Abstracts, and Reports

Abstract Title: A Quality Improvement Project to Reduce CAUTIs on Inpatient Units

Objectives:

1. Participants will be able to understand how interprofessional collaboration contributed to CAUTI reduction on inpatient acute care units.
2. Participants will be able to understand education nurses completed to reduce CAUTI rates on inpatient acute care units.

Purpose/Aims:

To reduce CAUTI rates for adult inpatients admitted to the acute care units: Progressive Care Unit (PCU), Surgical/Orthopedics, Medical/Oncology, and the Intensive Care Unit (ICU).

Background

An increase in CAUTI rates for adults admitted to inpatient units was identified in January of 2024. The CAUTI rate at that time was …

Letac-Mpc: Learning Model Predictive Control For Tactile-Reactive Grasping, Zhengtong Xu, Yu She

School of Industrial Engineering Faculty Publications

Grasping is a crucial task in robotics, necessitating tactile feedback and reactive grasping adjustments for robust grasping of objects under various conditions and with differing physical properties. In this article, we introduce LeTac-MPC, a learning-based model predictive control (MPC) for tactile-reactive grasping. Our approach enables the gripper to grasp objects with different physical properties on dynamic and force-interactive tasks. We utilize a vision-based tactile sensor, GelSight (Yuan et al. 2017), which is capable of perceiving high-resolution tactile feedback that contains information on the physical properties and states of the grasped object. LeTac-MPC incorporates a differentiable MPC layer designed to model …

Thermal Performance Of A Pump-Assisted Capillary Cooler, Danny J. Lohan, Bhaskarjyoti Sarma, Shailesh N. Joshi, Ercan M. Dede, Anali Soto, Srivathsan Sudhakar, Justin A. Weibel

CTRC Research Publications

The heat transfer and hydraulic performance of a flat evaporator, pump-assisted capillary loop cooler is evaluated for a 1 cm² heat source. The cooler consists of a copper manifold that houses a compensation chamber that feeds liquid to a sintered, flat evaporator wick below via a micro-tube array. Liquid evaporates from the copper wick as it is attached to the heater through a copper base plate. The custom cooler design offers separate flow routes for liquid and vapor phases during steady operation and thereby maintaining the pressure balance of the flow loop. The cooler performance is evaluated using de-ionized …

Assessing Industry-Critical Skill Development In Engineering Technology Capstone Courses, Rustin Webster, Matthew Turner

School of Engineering Technology Faculty Publications

To meet industrial expectations, engineering and engineering technology (ET) graduates are expected to possess the critical competencies of design, problem-solving, communication, and teamwork. However, industry stakeholders and academic studies routinely identify these as skills gaps: areas graduates need to develop to a higher standard or are currently lacking when entering the work force. To address this issue, many undergraduate programs in the United States have implemented a comprehensive and integrative experience at the end of an academic program, often called a capstone course(s). The rate of adoption has grown such that approximately three-quarters of all undergraduate and graduate institutions include …

Leto: Learning Constrained Visuomotor Policy With Differentiable Trajectory Optimization, Zhengtong Xu, Yu She

School of Industrial Engineering Faculty Publications

This paper introduces LeTO, a method for learning constrained visuomotor policy with differentiable trajectory optimization. Our approach integrates a differentiable optimization layer into the neural network. By formulating the optimization layer as a trajectory optimization problem, we enable the model to end-to-end generate actions in a safe and constraint-controlled fashion without extra modules. Our method allows for the introduction of constraint information during the training process, thereby balancing the training objectives of satisfying constraints, smoothing the trajectories, and minimizing errors with demonstrations. This “gray box” method marries optimization-based safety and interpretability with powerful representational abilities of neural networks. We quantitatively …

Course-Based Undergraduate Research Experiences (Cure) In Engineering Technology, Bill Hutzel, Craig Zywicki, Stephanie M. Gardner

School of Mechanical Engineering Faculty Publications

Although most universities provide excellent research experiences for outstanding undergraduate students, the number of interested students typically outstrips the supply of faculty and graduate student mentors. Addressing this shortfall is the reason Course-based Undergraduate Research Experiences (CUREs) were created. CUREs face obvious challenges because they operate at a larger scale than the traditional apprentice-based model for undergraduate research, creating resource issues for experimental research that requires equipment, laboratory space, and staff oversight. To help address these hurdles, one university has created a professional development program that provides training, collegial mentoring, and financial support to interested faculty. This paper provides an …

College Of Computing And Engineering Graduate Catalog 2024-2025, Nova Southeastern University

College of Psychological Services / College of Psychology Postgraduate Student and Course Catalogs

No abstract provided.

Implications Of Alternative Communications And Sensing Technologies For Implementing Variable Speed Limit Control Through Connected Vehicles: Sag Curve As A Case Study, Reza Vatani Nezafat, Mecit Cetin, Elizabeth Williams, George F. List

Civil & Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

Connected vehicles (CVs) will enable various applications to improve traffic flow. This paper's focus is to investigate how the potential implementation of variable speed limit (VSL) through different types of communication and sensing technologies on CVs makes it possible to mitigate congestion at a sag curve bottleneck. A VSL algorithm is developed and implemented in a simulation environment for controlling the inflow of vehicles to a sag curve to minimize delays and increase throughput. Both vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and infrastructure-to-vehicle (I2V) options for CVs are investigated when implementing the VSL control strategy in a simulation environment. Also, for measuring traffic density …

Automated Flood Depth Estimation On Roadways, Kwame Ampofo, Megan A. Witherow, Alex Glandon, Monibor Rahman, Ahmed Temtam, Mecit Cetin, Khan M. Iftekharuddin

Civil & Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

Recurrent nuisance flooding is common across many parts of the globe and causes extensive challenges for drivers on the roadways. The prevailing monitoring methods for roadway flooding are costly and not automated or effective. The ubiquity of visual data from cameras and advancements in computing such as deep learning may offer cost-effective methods for automated flood depth estimation on roadways based on reference objects such as cars. However, flood depth estimation faces challenges due to the limited amount of data annotated with water levels and diverse scenes showing reference objects at various scales and perspectives. This study proposes a novel …

User-Interaction With A Web-Served Global Ground Motion Relational Database, T. E. Buckreis, C. C. Nweke, P. Wang, S. J. Brandenberg, R. Shams, M. E. Ramos-Sepulveda, R. Pretell, S. Mazzoni

Civil & Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

We present an application programming interface (API) which facilitates public access to a global relational database of earthquake ground motion intensity measures, associated metadata, and time-series data. Next Generation Attenuation (NGA)-East and NGA-West2 project spreadsheets have been adapted into a relational database format composed of multiple tables through a series of primary and foreign keys. The combined dataset has been expanded to include contributions from earthquakes, generally with magnitudes greater than M3.9, that have occurred since the conclusion of the data synthesis component of both projects in 2011. Currently the database includes 62,449 ground motions recorded at 9,092 stations for …

Tractor Test 2282: John Deere 9rt 590 Diesel, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …

Tractor Test #2286: Claas 960 Terra Trac, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …

Tractor Test #2284: Claas Axion 930 Terra Trac, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …

Nebraska Summary #1288: Massey Ferguson 8s 265, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …

Tractor Test #2293: Kubota M7-134, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …

Nebraska Summary #1286: Massey Ferguson 8s 225, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …

Nebraska Summary #1285: Massey Ferguson 8s 205, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …

Nebraska Test #2289: Case Ih Steiger 525 Rowtrac, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …

Nebraska Test #2274: Case Ih Steiger 715 Quadtrac, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …

Nebraska Test #2275: Case Ih Steiger 475 Quadtrac, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …