Engineering Commons^™

Decision Support Model For Municipal Solid Waste Management At Department Of Defense Installations, John F. Muratore

Theses and Dissertations

This research focuses on the development of a decision support model to identify the preferred strategy for managing municipal solid waste using the principles of decision analysis theory. The model provides an effective decision making tool to evaluate and compare different municipal solid waste management strategies. The users of this model, the Environmental Manager or decision maker at a given installation, can enter installation-specific waste stream characteristics, treatment and disposal costs, and material buy-back prices to determine the expected value for various alternative strategies. The strategy having the greatest expected value is considered the preferred alternative. In calculating the expected …

Comparison Of Gravel Substrate Vs Soil Substrate For The Construction Of An Experimental Fen, Carolyn S. Langley

Theses and Dissertations

Under the Clean Water Act Section 404 of 1972 and 33 CFR 320-330 and 40 CFR 230 moderate the destruction of wetlands by the Air Force to make way for other uses. To obtain a permit for a design or construction project which affects a wetland, the Air Force must agree to create new wetlands, or replace lost wetland acreage through wetland creation or restoration. The Air Force is interested in building 'successful' wetlands as inexpensively as possible. It has been common practice to use hydric soil, which often had to be hauled in, as the substrate at the restored …

A System Dynamics Approach To Modelling The Degradation Of Biochemical Oxygen Demand In A Constructed Wetland Receiving Stormwater Runoff, Leslie A. Mudgett

Theses and Dissertations

The objective of this research was to develop a tool to aid the Air Force Environmental Manager in the identification of the design parameters of a constructed wetland system that may be optimized to provide a desired biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) removal efficiency during the treatment of Air Force stormwater runoff. The objective is achieved through the development and use of a system dynamics model which simulates the hydrological functions of a constructed wetland as well as the processes within the wetland responsible for degradation of BOD. Based on literature review, the primary mechanism responsible for the degradation of BOD …

A Case Study Of The Environmental Impacts Of The Beddown Of The C-17 Globemaster Iii At Charleston Afb, Richard H. Houghton Jr.

Theses and Dissertations

Unites States Air Force acquisition environmental planning has changed significantly since the passage of the National Environmental Policy Act in 1969. This research examined the role of environmental planning in weapon system acquisition. It focused on environmental planning performed for the C-17 Globemaster III prior to its beddown at Charleston Air Force Base. The case study of the C- 17 beddown included interviews, archival record reviews, and direct observations at the base. Evidence was collected to determine what environmental impacts occurred during the beddown. An environmental postaudit compared actual impacts with those predicted in environmental planning documentation. Impacts were analyzed …

Optimal Formation Flight Control, Shawn B. Mccamish

Theses and Dissertations

Automatic formation flight involves controlling multiple wing aircraft equipped with standard Mach-hold, altitude-hold, and heading-hold autopilots in order to maintain a desired position relative to a lead aircraft throughout formation maneuvers. Changes in the lead aircraft's states, including formation heading, velocity, altitude, and geometry changes, are treated as disturbance and are rejected by the formation flight control system. The work in this thesis is a continuation of five previous theses, dealing with the design of formation flight control systems. The goal of the optimal formation flight control design is to achieve robust formation maintenance in the face of formation maneuvers …

Multiple Model Adaptive Control Of The Vista F-16, Michael J. Stepaniak

Theses and Dissertations

Multiple model adaptive control (MMAC) is investigated using the high-fidelity, nonlinear, six-degree-of-freedom Simulation Rapid-Prototyping Facility VISTA F-16. Detection of single actuator and sensor failures is considered, with an MMAC algorithm initially pursued which allows a controller specifically designed for each particular failure condition to replace the standard F-16 Block 40 flight control system (FCS) once the failure is detected. The synthesis of certain discrete-time LQG/PI controllers (those using control variables linearly dependent on state derivatives) is shown to be unattainable due to numerical difficulties. A novel control technique, termed control redistribution, is introduced which redistributes control commands (that would normally …

A Quantitative Feedback Theory Fcs Design For The Subsonic Envelope Of The Vista F-16 Including Configuration Variation And Aerodynamic Control Effector Failures, Vicent J. Cacciatore

Theses and Dissertations

Fault tolerant flight control systems for combat aircraft are an alternative to excessively redundant aircraft designs or reconfigurable control laws. However, due to the range of flight conditions within a combat aircraft's operational flight envelope, the variety of its configurations, and the unavailability of an aerodynamic data base for damaged aircraft, designing fault tolerant systems is a complicated endeavor. Quantitative Feedback Theory is a robust control design technique especially well-suited to manage the structured parametric uncertainty inherent in this problem, and consequently is applied as the primary design tool for this research. Furthermore, realistic failure models are developed for the …

Design, Fabrication And Characterization Of Micro Opto-Electro-Mechanical Systems, Darren E. Sene

Theses and Dissertations

Several micro-opto-electro-mechanical structures were designed using the Multi-User MEMS Process (MUMPS). Specific design techniques were investigated for improving the capabilities of elevating flip up structures. The integration of several flip up microoptical structures into a microoptical system was explored with emphasis on the development of a microinterferometer. The thermal effects on the Modulus of Elasticity were determined by detecting the resonant frequency for a square Flexure Beam Micromirror Device. The resonance of the device was found to match theory to within 0.1 % and the Modulus of Elasticity was found to decrease by 0.041 GPa/K from 290 to 450 K. …

Computer Aided Detection Of Microcalcifications Utilizing Texture Analysis, Ronald C. Dauk

Theses and Dissertations

A comparative study of texture measures for the classification of breast tissue is presented. The texture features investigated include Angular Second Moments, Power Spectrum Analysis and a novel feature, Laws Energy Ratios. The texture study was accomplished as part of the development of a Model Based Vision (MBV) system for the automatic detection of microcalcifications. An overview of the Microcalcification Detection System is presented, which applies image differencing techniques, feature selection methods, and neural networks for locating microcalcification clusters in mammograms. The Power Spectrum Analysis feature set had the best overall performance with an 83% Probability of Detection and an …

Design And Analysis Of A Navigation System Using The Federated Filter, Stephen J. Delory

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this paper was to design and analyse a federated filter design, to be used for retrofit of an Embedded GPS/INS (EGI) navigation unit into an existing Kalman filter-based air navigation system. A design was selected and simulations were conducted in the Distributed Kalman Filter Simulation software (DKFSIM). As well, a centralized Kalman filter design was simulated under identical conditions for comparison purposes. The federated filter was shown to be a feasible design, with accuracy in position and velocity very close to centralized Kalman filter values. The federated filter design also showed some attractive fault detection and isolation …

Activation Of Precipitated Iron Fischer-Tropsch Catalysts, Mehul D. Shroff

Chemical and Biological Engineering ETDs

The Fischer-Tropsch Synthesis (FTS) is an important step in the manufacture of synthetic fuels from coal. The use of iron catalysts for FTS, though desirable from the standpoint of process economy, is hampered by problems relating to catalyst attrition and carbon buildup. In addition, from a research perspective, there has been a long-standing controversy in the literature with regard to the nature of the active phase.

The effect of activation and reaction treatments on the resulting phase transformations in a commercial, precipitated and spray-dried, Fe₂O₃ - CuO - K₂O Fischer-Tropsch catalyst have been studied. Different …

Equivalent Relationship Of Function-Level Representation And Implementation Of Unified Indexing Of Fft Algorithms, Nee-Hua Cho

Dissertations and Theses

With the advance of the VLSI technology, the FFT algorithm has been pushed further in solving the multidimensional array signal processing in real time. Many DSP chip users have tried to find ways to improve addressing huge data in multidimension systems with minimum cost and maximum performance. However, there is no efficient method to address data for 1-D to M-D FFTs.

A methodology has been defined to conquer the addressing problem of M-D FFT. It is well known that the twiddle factor matrix of Discrete Fourier Transform (DFT) can be recursively factored into basic butterfly stage matrices. The matrix can …

Malt Drying Model Verification For Efficiency Improvement, John David Kribs

Dissertations and Theses

The aim of this work has been to minimize the thermal energy required to dry malt in deep beds while maintaining malt quality, and without increasing the drying time more than one hour. Malt drying usually takes place in deep bed (.7-1 m) driers by forcing hot air through the bed.

Measurements of inlet and outlet relative humidity, temperature, and airflow at a drier at Great Western Malting Company's Vancouver, Washington facility were made to find average moisture content versus time. The measurements were used to develop a wetted surface model of a malt bed. However, the model was not …

A Feasibility Study On The Automation Of Domestic Airline Passenger Customer Service Check-In Procedures For Far Part 121 Carriers, Don Michael Trevor Bennett

Master's Theses - Daytona Beach

This study was conducted in an attempt to determine whether airlines can benefit from a fully automated customer service system which will be used by major, Part 121, operators for domestic travel purposes only. The proposed system will be designed to alleviate airport terminals check-in counter congestion and improve customer service personnel effectiveness and efficiency.

Domestic traffic is expected to increase by 50 percent by the year 2004. An Automatic Ticketing and Baggage (ATB) system will allow passengers to process all flight related transactions only once. A self checking-in system allows a passenger to obtain boarding passes and destination bag …

Development And Testing Of A New Optimum Design Code For Hypersonic Wind Tunnel Nozzles, Including Boundary Layer, Turbulence, And Real Gas Effects, Ralph C. Tolle

Theses and Dissertations

A robust and efficient optimization code is developed and validated. The code is used to redesign an existing Mach 12 wind tunnel nozzle and utilizes response surface methodology (RSM) techniques. Explicit, globally second-order, flux-difference-splitting algorithms are used to solve the Navier-Stokes (NS) and Parabolized Navier-Stokes (PNS) flow solvers incorporated into the optimizer code. Either the Baldwin-Lomax or the Yang-Shih k-s turbulence model may be employed in the optimization code. First, 2-D/axisymmetric NS and PNS flow solvers are developed/modified and account for perfect gas/nonequilibrium chemically reacting flows. All solvers are validated against Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) and experimental data. The optimization …

Analysis Of Soil Vapor Extraction Expenses To Estimate Bioventing Expenses, Steven M. Loken

Theses and Dissertations

An in-depth analysis of the expenses incurred with five soil venting petroleum remediation projects was accomplished. The data was obtained from receipts provided by a major United States petroleum refiner and distributor. Cost categories were designed that incorporated all costs and provided a method to analyze the data. The five cost categories used were: permits, equipment, management, utilities, and analysis. Further analysis showed trends and described the behavior of the costs related to remediation events. The relative percentile for each cost category was found to be consistent among the projects. Many costs were also found to be very linear throughout …

Use Of Respirometry To Determine The Effect Of Nutrient Enhancement On Jp-8 Biodegradability, Christian T. Totten

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to use respirometry to measure the impact of nutrient combinations or treatments on JP - 8 biodegradation under simulated fuel spill soil conditions. The study was designed observe one soil type at a constant fuel exposure level of 1% and a constant moisture of 60% of field capacity. Three experiments conducted were of two and three factor designs with potassium nitrate and sodium phosphate addition levels serving as two factors and fuel serving as a third factor in Experiments 1 and 2. Cumulative oxygen values obtained by the respirometer were assumed to be a …

Finite Element Study Of The Flat Strip Rolling Process Using A Deformable Roll Model, Hany George Harmouch

Archived Theses and Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Intermodal Commuter Network Planning, Maria P. Boile

Dissertations

An intermodal commuter network is an integration of passenger transportation systems, or modes, to a single comprehensive system that provides connections among the various modes, and improved travel choices to users. In the system examined in this dissertation, commuters access their final destination via auto, rail, and intermodal auto-to-rail modes. There are numerous highway paths by which a commuter can reach the final destination. Once on the highway, the commuter can switch to rail at stations along the rail route. The commuter may also choose to walk to the rail station closest to the trip's origin.

The main focus of …

Removal Of Vocs From Air By Absorption And Stripping In Hollow Fiber Devices, Tarun K. Poddar

Dissertations

Large volumes of exhaust air streams contaminated with volatile organic compounds (VOCs) such as toluene, xylene, acetone etc. are discharged into the atmosphere by various industrial facilities. Common technologies for VOC emission abatement e.g., activated carbon adsorption, absorption in a liquid, incineration and catalytic oxidation, have many strengths as well as considerable limitations. In this study, a regenerative absorption-based removal of VOCs from N₂ in an inert, nonvolatile, organic liquid flowing in compact hollow fiber devices has been developed. The process eliminates flooding, loading and entrainment encountered in conventional absorption devices.

Contaminated air/N₂ stream was fed through the …

Computer-Aided Process Design For Waste Minimization, Konstadinos Abeliotis

Dissertations

Problems related to process design with environmental considerations have been studied in this dissertation. A new heuristic design methodology has been formulated with the objective of minimizing the adverse environmental impact of chemical processes.

This hierarchical methodology starts with the definition and analysis of a process flowsheet followed by quantification of the process environmental loads. The quantification of environmental loads is an essential aspect of this methodology, because it serves as the comparative measure for environmental performance.

If the calculated environmental loads do not satisfy the environmental constraints (e.g., regulatory limits), waste minimization is investigated in the following order:

• Pollution …

A Theoretical Analysis Of Volatile Contaminant Removal By The Pneumatic Fracturing Process, Yuan Ding

Dissertations

A mathematical model that simulates the process of contaminant removal from a pneumatically induced fracture within a porous medium is presented. It includes: (1) model development; (2) parameter evaluation; (3) statistical sensitivity analysis; and (4) model validation.

Based on the dual porosity approach, a mathematical model for a fractured porous formation is developed for both two dimensional and axial symmetrical cases. This model constitutes a pair of coupled partial differential equations for the porous medium and discrete fracture, respectively. The initial and boundary conditions have been determined based on field considerations of a soil vapor extraction system. By means of …

Vibration As An Aid In Robotic Peg-In-Hole Assembly, Hsin-Te Liao

Dissertations

This dissertation presents an analytical and experimental investigation of vibration assisted engagement for parts mating. A dynamic model of assembly is established by using Lagrange's equation for impact to derive impact equations for a robotic manipulator in peg-in-hole assembly. The model can be used to analyze part motion and contact force in the mating of parts by robots. The impact equations of a SCARA robot are derived using this model and utilized to investigate how robot configuration, insertion speed, chamfer angle, coefficient of restitution and other system parameters affect impulsive force and departure angle in the assembly of a peg …

Particle Deposition On Surfaces In A Divergent Channal Flow, Ding Sun

Dissertations

Particle trajectory and deposition of two phase gas-solid flows in a convergent or divergent two-dimensional channel are investigated numerically in a wide range of parameters. For the fluid phase, a two dimensional, incompressible laminar fluid flow is considered in the analysis. The particle phase is a diluted suspension. The effects of inertia, gravity, viscous force and electrostatic image force are included in the computational model.

Both convergent and divergent channel flow are solved by the finite element method based on the software FIDAP. The flow separations will appear in a divergent channel and their separation positions are obtained in the …

Performance Analysis For Genetic Algorithms., Hermrean Wong

Dissertations

Genetic algorithms have been shown effective for solving complex optimization problems such as job scheduling, machine learning, pattern recognition, and assembly planning. Due to the random process involved in genetic algorithms, the analysis of performance characteristics of genetic algorithms is a challenging research topic. Studied in this dissertation are methods to analyze convergence of genetic algorithms and to investigate whether modifications made to genetic algorithms, such as varying the operator rates during the iterative process, improve their performance. Both statistical analysis, which is used for investigation of different modifications to the genetic algorithm, and probability analysis, which is used to …

The Effect Of Chlorine, Sulfur And Phosphorus Compounds On Deactivation Of Palladium Catalysts, Tai-Chiang Yu

Dissertations

The effects of HCl, H₂S, tributyl phosphate (TBP), P₂O₅, and zinc dialkyldithophosphate (ZDP) as catalyst poisons for methane oxidation over palladium catalysts supported on γ-alumina were investigated in this study. The overall reaction rate of methane oxidation over palladium catalysts can be simplified into a pseudo first order reaction under excess oxidation conditions.

The deactivation of the catalyst poisoned by HCl is attributed to the loss of active sites due to volatilization of PdCl₂. H₂ treatment at 200 °C can reactivate the catalyst poisoned by HCl at temperatures of up to …

The Effect Of Liquid Gallium On Plastics, Vivek P. Dwivedi

Theses

As part of a joint effort by Cornell University and NJIT to find a replacement for mercury as a pressuring medium for P-V-T devices, we investigated the effect of liquid gallium on four thermoplastics: two semi-crystalline ( high density polyethylene and polypropylene ) and two amorphous ( polystyrene and polymethylmethacrylate ). Test specimens were covered with liquid gallium and held in vacuum oven at temperatures close to their melting points for up to two weeks. Change in weight after treatment with gallium was measured, along with tensile testing and particle analysis using dispersion x-ray spectroscopy. The results are compared with …

Removal Of Vocs From Waste Gas Streams By A Hollow Fiber Permeator, Varinder Pal Malik

Theses

Removal of various VOCs from air/nitrogen feed streams using a novel hollow fiber membrane was studied. Hollow Fiber Module (HFM) used had composite silicone membranes wherein an ultrathin (~ 1μm), nonporous silicone rubber membrane layer had been plasma polymerized on a porous (porosity: 0.4) polypropylene substrate. VOCs studied were toluene, methanol, acetone, methylene chloride and hexane. Primary focus was on single VOCs, although separation of VOC mixtures was also briefly studied. HFM was found to be extremely effective in removing various VOCs from feed streams. Removal of 90-99 % of various VOCs was achieved at low feed flow rates and …

Analysis Of Cim Performance Using Different Lan Structures A Simulation Approach, Kirk Rawle

Theses

This research illustrates a systematic procedure for modeling and performance analysis of the integration effect of communication network to the physical system. The concept is to model different layouts of Computer Integration Manufacturing (CIM) using different Local Area Network(LAN) structures. The steps to accomplish this concepts are, a) To determine the performance measures for physical layouts and the communication network, in order to obtain a performance analysis. b) Modeling the physical layout using Promodel simulation package. c) Extracting results from the outcome of the simulation of the physical layout and using this as input to the communication network simulation. d) …

A Study Of Settlement In Landfills Due To Biodegradation, Michael Guasconi

Theses

Finding new space for landfills is difficult due to land availability, stringent environmental regulations, and public sentiment. So other means of waste disposal, such as hauling it to a distant landfill, or incinerating it, will have to be resorted to. These methods may be unpopular with the public involved. By studying settlement due to biodegradation, ways to increase settlement can be found, allowing for additional waste disposal capacity in operating, and closed landfills.

Existing theoretical models are based on rheological concepts, not on biodegradation. So, they do not realistically model settlement. In this study, a model to determine the rate, …