Engineering Commons^™

User Quality Of Experience-Aware Multimedia Streaming Over Wireless Home Area Network, Gabriel-Miro Muntean, Nicola Cranley

Conference papers

For multimedia streaming over wireless networks, there is a trade-off between the capacity of the wireless links and the end-user perceived-quality, which can be affected by the compression scheme used, content characteristics and adaptation algorithm (if any). In this paper, this trade-off is investigated for streaming various motion content multimedia over an IEEE 802.11b-based Wireless-Home Area Network using the Quality-Oriented Adaptation Scheme (QOAS). QOAS performance is compared to that of a non-adaptive scheme when using MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 encoding in terms of average end-user perceived quality, number of streaming sessions concurrently supported, loss rate, delay, jitter and total throughput. Simulation …

Santa Clara Magazine, Volume 48 Number 4, Spring 2007, Santa Clara University

Santa Clara Magazine

8 - ARCHAEOLOGISTS OF THE CARIBBEAN By Monte Lorenzet. Eye patch and peg leg-we all know what makes a pirate. Or do we? Only recently have scientists taken a serious look at the archeology of piracy, with SCU's Russ Skowronek one of the hearties unearthing facts buried beneath centuries of myth.

12 - ARE PEOPLE GETTING CRAZIER? By Thomas G. Plante. From what the media offers every day, you can't help but think the world is going to hell in a handbasket. What's really going on? And what can we do about it?

21 - A TEACHABLE MOMENT Q&A with …

Generating Linear Temporal Logic Formulas For Pattern-Based Specifications, Salamah Salamah, Vladik Kreinovich, Ann Q. Gates

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Software property classifications and patterns, i.e., high-level abstractions that describe program behavior, have been used to assist practitioners in specifying properties. The Specification Pattern System (SPS) provides descriptions of a collection of patterns. Each pattern is associated with a scope that defines the extent of program execution over which a property pattern is considered. Based on a selected pattern, SPS provides a specification for each type of scope in multiple formal languages including Linear Temporal Logic (LTL). The Property Specification tool (Prospec) extends SPS by introducing the notion of Composite Propositions (CP), that classify sequential and concurrent behavior over pattern …

Fitting A Normal Distribution To Interval And Fuzzy Data, Gang Xiang, Vladik Kreinovich, Scott Ferson

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In traditional statistical analysis, if we know that the distribution is normal, then the most popular way to estimate its mean a and standard deviation s from the data sample x1,...,xn is to equate a and s to the arithmetic mean and sample standard deviation of this sample. After this equation, we get the cumulative distribution function F(x)=F0((x-a)/s) of the desired distribution.

In many practical situations, we only know intervals [xi] that contain the actual (unknown) values of xi or, more generally, a fuzzy number that describes xi. Different values of xi lead, in general, to different values of F(x). …

Under Interval And Fuzzy Uncertainty, Symmetric Markov Chains Are More Difficult To Predict, Roberto Araiza, Gang Xiang, Olga Kosheleva, Damjan Skulj

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Markov chains are an important tool for solving practical problems. In particular, Markov chains have been successfully applied in bioinformatics. Traditional statistical tools for processing Markov chains assume that we know the exact probabilities p(i,j) of a transition from the state i to the state j. In reality, we often only know these transition probabilities with interval (or fuzzy) uncertainty. We start the paper with a brief reminder of how the Markov chain formulas can be extended to the cases of such interval and fuzzy uncertainty.

In some practical situations, there is another restriction on the Markov chain--that this Markov …

Towards Combining Probabilistic, Interval, Fuzzy Uncertainty, And Constraints: On The Example Of Inverse Problem In Geophysics, George R. Keller, Scott A. Starks, Aaron Velasco, Matthew Averill, Roberto Araiza, Gang Xiang, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In many real-life situations, we have several types of uncertainty: measurement uncertainty can lead to probabilistic and/or interval uncertainty, expert estimates come with interval and/or fuzzy uncertainty, etc. In many situations, in addition to measurement uncertainty, we have prior knowledge coming from prior data processing, prior knowledge coming from prior interval constraints. In this paper, on the example of the seismic inverse problem, we show how to combine these different types of uncertainty.

Adding Constraints To Situations When, In Addition To Intervals, We Also Have Partial Information About Probabilities, Martine Ceberio, Vladik Kreinovich, Gang Xiang, Scott Ferson, Cliff Joslyn

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In many practical situations, we need to combine probabilistic and interval uncertainty. For example, we need to compute statistics like population mean E=(x1+...+xn)/n or population variance V=(x1^2+...+xn^2)/n-E^2 in the situations when we only know intervals [xi] of possible values of xi. In this case, it is desirable to compute the range of the corresponding characteristic.

Some range computation problems are NP-hard; for these problems, in general, only an enclosure is possible. For other problems, there are efficient algorithms. In many practical situations, we have additional information that can be used as constraints on possible cumulative distribution functions (cdfs). For example, …

The Onset For Compressibility Effects For Aerofoils In Ground Effect, G. Doig, T.J. Barber, E. Leonardi, A.J. Neely

Aerospace Engineering

The influence of flow compressibility on a highly-cambered inverted aerofoil in ground effect is presented, based on two-dimensional computational studies. This type of problem has relevance to open-wheel racing cars, where local regions of high-speed subsonic flow form under favourable pressure gradients, even though the maximum freestream Mach number is typically considerably less than Mach 0.3. An important consideration for CFD users in the field is addressed in this paper, the freestream Mach number at which flow compressibility significantly affects aerodynamic performance. More broadly, for aerodynamicists, the consequences of this are also considered. Comparisons between incompressible and compressible CFD siulations …

Investigation Of The Lead-Free Solder Joint Shear Performance, James Webster, Jianbiao Pan, Brian J. Toleno

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Reflow profile has significant impact on solder joint performance because it influences wetting and microstructure of the solder joint. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of reflow profile and thermal shock on the shear performance of eutectic SnPb (SnPb) and Sn3.0Ag0.5Cu (SAC305) solder joints. Test boards were assembled with four different sized surface mount chip resistors (1206, 0805, 0603 and 0402). Nine reflow profiles for SAC 305 and nine reflow profiles for SnPb were developed with three levels of peak temperature (12ºC, 22ºC, and 32ºC above solder liquidus temperature, or 230ºC, 240ºC, and 250ºC for SAC …

Lower Extremity Mechanics During Cutting Tasks In Different Shoe-Turf Combinations, Rafael Garcilazo

McNair Scholars Research Journal

The demands placed on the lower extremity when performing jumping and cutting maneuvers are depending, in part, on the interaction between the playing surface and the athlete's footwear. Higher demands are likely to result in increased incidence of injury, so for safety reasons it is important to quantify how the shoe-turf interface affects joint loads. The purpose of this study is to compare the forces on the lower extremity while landing and side cutting (rapid direction change at approximately 45 degrees) on artificial football turf with different styles of football cleats.

Greenwood & Massey's Mill Turnpike Company (Sc 1467), Manuscripts & Folklife Archives

Manuscript Collection Finding Aids

Finding aid and scan (Click on "Additional Files" below) for Manuscripts Small Collection 1467. Minute book, 1886-1899, for the Greenwood & Massey's Mill Turnpike Company, Warren County, Kentucky. The last two pages contain a plat and a listing of expenses for the Plano Church Cemetery, 1905-1909.

A Lean Modeling Protocol For Evaluating Green Project Delivery, Leidy E. Klotz, Michael Horman, Mark Bodenschatz

Publications

The first vital step to leaning an operation is to model or map the processes used to deliver value in that operation. This allows the requisite understanding of where waste and non value-adding activity exists, and provides the foundation for improvement. Current protocols for modeling operations present the basic tenets for lean mapping, but tend to be based in manufacturing language, and are not easily adapted to capital facilities projects. “Green” or “sustainable” capital projects delivered using current project delivery systems seem to be laden with hidden waste. These projects tend to be more challenging to deliver due increased levels …

Decomposable Aggregability In Population Genetics And Evolutionary Computations: Algorithms And Computational Complexity, Vladik Kreinovich, Max Shpak

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Many dynamical systems are decomposably aggregable in the sense that one can divide their (micro)variables x1,...,xn into several (k) non-overlapping blocks and find combinations y1,...,yk of variables from these blocks (macrovariables) whose dynamics depend only on the initial values of the macrovariables. For example, the state of a biological population can be described by listing the frequencies xi of different genotypes i; in this example, the corresponding functions fi(x1,...,xn) describe the effects of mutation, recombination, and natural selection in each generation.

Another example of a system where detecting aggregability is important is a one that describes the dynamics of an …

Cuando Viene El Agua: Percepciones De Los Impactos Sociales Del Proyecto Hidroeléctrico “Chan-75” En Las Comunidades Ubicadas En La Cuenca Del Río Changuinola, Bocas Del Toro, Jeffery D. Stein

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

This report analyzes the anticipated social impacts of a hydroelectric project, titled “Chan-75,” in the surrounding communities. The project is located in the Bosque Protector de Palo Seco (BPPS) protected area along the Changuinola River. The flooding of 750 ha to create a reservoir for the dam will require the resettlement of roughly 1,000 residents of at least four indigenous Ngöbe Buglé communities including Valle del Rey, Charco la Pava, Changuinola Arriba, and Guayabal, in addition to the submersion of thousands of ha of farmland belonging to residents of nearby communities (Cordero et al). Once completed, the dam will generate …

Ole Miss Engineer 2007

Ole Miss Engineer

No abstract provided.

A History Of Maintenance: Implementing Mp2, Julie Thomas

Mahurin Honors College Capstone Experience/Thesis Projects

This document was created to help maintenance departments in reducing downtime. The main focus of this manual is to teach maintenance personnel how to implement and use the CMMS program known as MP2. By using MP2, problem areas within a plant can be identified and tracked by electronically storing equipment information. This method will ultimately lead to less reactive maintenance and more preventive maintenance, which will therefore lessen downtime.

Polarization Dependence Of Bend Loss For A Standard Singlemode Fiber, Qian Wang, Ginu Rajan, Pengfei Wang, Gerald Farrell

Articles

Polarization dependence of bend loss caused by the polymer coating layer for a standard singlemode fiber (SMF28) is investigated theoretically and experimentally. Bend loss for SMF28 for both the TE and TM mode is calculated separately. Normalized polarization dependent loss is proposed for the characterization of the polarization sensitivity of bend loss for different bend radii. Corresponding experimental tests are presented, which agree with the theoretical results. Both the theoretical and experimental results show that the polymer coating layer has a significant influence on the polarization dependence of bend loss.

Computational Constitutive Model For Predicting Nonlinear Viscoelastic Damage And Fracture Failure Of Asphalt Concrete Mixtures, Yong-Rak Kim, D. H. Allen, D. N. Little

Department of Engineering Mechanics: Faculty Publications

A computational constitutive model was developed to predict damage and fracture failure of asphalt concrete mixtures. Complex heterogeneity and inelastic mechanical behavior are addressed by the model by using finite-element methods and elastic– viscoelastic constitutive relations. Damage evolution due to progressive cracking is represented by randomly oriented interface fracture, which is governed by a newly developed nonlinear viscoelastic cohesive zone model. Computational simulations demonstrate that damage evolution and failure of asphalt concrete mixtures is dependent on the mechanical properties of the mixture. This approach is suitable for the relative evaluation of asphalt concrete mixtures by simply employing material properties and …

A Finite Difference Method For Studying Thermal Deformation In Two-Dimensional Micro Scale Metal Thin Films Exposed To Ultrashort Pulsed Lasers, Haojie Wang

Doctoral Dissertations

Ultrashort-pulsed lasers have been attracting worldwide interest in science and engineering because the lasers with pulse durations on the order of sub-picoseconds to femtoseconds possess capabilities in limiting the undesirable spread of the thermal process zone in a heated sample during material processing at the microscale. Prevention of thermal damage is an important factor for success of ultrashort-pulsed lasers in real applications. The thermal damage induced by ultrashort pulses is intrinsically different from that induced by long-pulse or continuous lasers. It occurs after the heating pulse is over and involves the shattering of thin metal layers (without a clear signature …

Stress And Emotion Classification Using Jitter And Shimmer Features, Xi Li, Jidong Tao, Michael T. Johnson, Joseph Soltis, Anne Savage, Kirsten Leong, John D. Newman

Dr. Dolittle Project: A Framework for Classification and Understanding of Animal Vocalizations

In this paper, we evaluate the use of appended jitter and shimmer speech features for the classification of human speaking styles and of animal vocalization arousal levels. Jitter and shimmer features are extracted from the fundamental frequency contour and added to baseline spectral features, specifically Mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCCs) for human speech and Greenwood function cepstral coefficients (GFCCs) for animal vocalizations. Hidden Markov models (HMMs) with Gaussian mixture models (GMMs) state distributions are used for classification. The appended jitter and shimmer features result in an increase in classification accuracy for several illustrative datasets, including the SUSAS dataset for human speaking …

Biomedical Applications Of Polypeptide Multilayer Nanofilms And Microcapsules, Jai Simha S. Rudra

Doctoral Dissertations

The past few years have witnessed considerable growth in synthetic polymer chemistry and physics, biomaterials science, and nano-scale engineering. Research on polypeptide multilayer films, coatings, and microcapsules is located at the intersection of these areas and are promising materials for applications in medicine, biotechnology, environmental science. Most envisioned applications of polypeptide multilayers have a biomedical bent. This dissertation on polypeptide multilayer film applications covers key points of polypeptides as materials, means of polymer production, film preparation, film characterization methods, and key points of current research in basic science. Both commercial and designed peptides have been used to fabricate films for …

Why Intervals? Why Fuzzy Numbers? Towards A New Justification, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

The purpose of this paper is to present a new characterization of the set of all intervals (and of the corresponding set of fuzzy numbers). This characterization is based on several natural properties useful in mathematical modeling; the main of these properties is the necessity to be able to combine (fuse) several pieces of knowledge.

Fern: An Updatable Authenticated Dictionary Suitable For Distributed Caching, Eric Freudenthal, David Herrera, Steve Gutstein, Ryan Spring, Luc Longpre

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Fern is an updatable cryptographically authenticated dictionary developed to propagate identification and authorization information within and among distributed systems. Conventional authenticated dictionaries permit authorization information to be disseminated by untrusted proxies, however these proxies must maintain full duplicates of the dictionary structure. In contrast, Fern incrementally distributes components of its dictionary as required to satisfy client requests and thus is suitable for deployments where clients are likely to require only a small fraction of a dictionary's contents and connectivity may be limited.

When dictionary components must be obtained remotely, the latency of lookup and validation operations is dominated by communication …

Towards Interval Techniques For Processing Educational Data, Olga Kosheleva, Vladik Kreinovich, Luc Longpre, Mourat Tchoshanov, Gang Xiang

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

There are many papers that experimentally compare effectiveness of different teaching techniques. Most of these papers use traditional statistical approach to process the experimental results. The traditional statistical approach is well suited to numerical data but often, what we are processing is intervals (e.g., A means anything from 90 to 100). We show that the use of interval techniques leads to more adequate processing of educational data.

Architectural Assertions: Checking Architectural Constraints At Run-Time, Hyotaeg Jung, Carlos E. Rubio-Medrano, Eric Wong, Yoonsik Cheon

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

The inability to express architectural concepts and constraints explicitly in implementation code invites the problem of architectural drift and corrosion. We propose runtime checks as a solution to mitigate this problem. The key idea of our approach is to express architectural constraints or properties in an assertion language and use the runtime assertion checker of the assertion language to detect any violations of the constraints. The architectural assertions are written in terms of architectural concepts such as components, connectors, and configurations, and thus they can be easily mapped to or traced back to the original high-level constraints written in an …

Towards A General Description Of Interval Multiplications: Algebraic Analysis And Its Relation To T-Norms, Olga Kosheleva, Guenter Mayer, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

It is well known that interval computations are very important, both by themselves (as a method for processing data known with interval uncertainty) and as a way to process fuzzy data. In general, the problem of computing the range of a given function under interval uncertainty is computationally difficult (NP-hard). As a result, there exist different methods for estimating such a range: some methods require a longer computation time and lead to more accurate results, other methods lead to somewhat less accurate results but are much faster than the more accurate techniques. In particular, different methods exist for interval multiplication, …

Throttling I/O Streams To Accelerate File-I/O Performance, Seetharami Seelam, Andre Kerstens, Patricia J. Teller

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

To increase the scale and performance of scientific applications, scientists commonly distribute computation over multiple processors. Often without realizing it, file I/O is parallelized with the computation. An implication of this I/O parallelization is that multiple compute tasks are likely to concurrently access the I/O nodes of an HPC system. When a large number of I/O streams concurrently access an I/O node, I/O performance tends to degrade. In turn, this impacts application execution time.

This paper presents experimental results that show that controlling the number of synchronous file-I/O streams that concurrently access an I/O node can enhance performance. We call …

Von Mises Failure Criterion In Mechanics Of Materials: How To Efficiently Use It Under Interval And Fuzzy Uncertainty, Gang Xiang, Andrzej Pownuk, Olga Kosheleva, Scott A. Starks

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

One of the main objective of mechanics of materials is to predict when the material experiences fracture (fails), and to prevent this failure. With this objective in mind, it is desirable to use {it ductile} materials, i.e., materials which can sustain large deformations without failure. Von Mises criterion enables us to predict the failure of such ductile materials. To apply this criterion, we need to know the exact stresses applied at different directions. In practice, we only know these stresses with interval or fuzzy uncertainty. In this paper, we describe how we can apply this criterion under such uncertainty, and …

Interfaces, Volume 9, Issue 1 - Spring 2007

INTERFACES: Newsletter of the Nebraska Center for Materials and Nanoscience

CONTENTS
From the Director
Facility Focus: Crystallography
Recent Achievements of Center Researchers
Catalysts For Carbon Monoxide Conversion
NCMN Welcomes Li Tan
Research Spotlight: Christian Binek
LNK Chemsolutions Receives Funding

Improved Refinement Coefficients' Coding In Scalable H.264, Rahul Panchal

Electrical Engineering Theses - Archive

This thesis proposes to replace the adaptation used to select VLC table for coding of the refinement coefficient by signaling to the decoder which table should be used for which macroblock type (Inter or Intra) in scalable H.264. This part of the proposal aims at reducing decoder complexity and ensuring proper table selection when both macroblock types are present within one slice. The contribution further proposes to extend the method used in SVC to increase coding efficiency of CABAC refinement coefficient coding to "VLC" refinement coefficients coding. All the coding tools are integrated into JSVM_7_10 and the performance is tested. …