Engineering Commons^™

Toward A Flying Mems Robot, Nathan E. Glauvitz

Theses and Dissertations

The work in this thesis includes the design, modeling, and testing of motors and rotor blades to be used on a millimeter-scale helicopter style flying micro air vehicle (MAV). Three different types of motor designs were developed and tested, which included circular scratch drives, electrostatic motors, and comb drive resonators. Six different rotor designs were tested; five used residual stress while one design used photoresist to act as a hinge to achieve rotor blade deflection. Two key parameters of performance were used to evaluate the motor and rotor blade designs: the frequency of motor rotation and the angle of deflection …

Thermally Activated, Variable Blazed Grating For Coherent Beam Steering, Matthew T. Johnson

Theses and Dissertations

The ability to perform non-mechanical optical beam steering is of critical importance in laser communication and remote sensing; it is as vital as a phased-array antenna is for RADAR. Directed energy transmission and direction-selective reception increase performance and produce tactical advantage in DoD applications. However, specific geometric features of non-mechanical beam steering devices must be designed in proportion to the wavelength of the monochromatic light to be steered. Also, the ability to handle higher energies by reducing the energy per unit requires large areas of uniform properties on the micrometer scale. These challenges have been addressed in the past using …

Material Characterization Improvement In High Temperature Rectangle Waveguide Measurements, Eric A. Buschelman

Theses and Dissertations

This research presents a method by which electromagnetic characterization of materials in a partially filled waveguide can be accurately performed. Higher order modes are excited by the geometry, which are not accounted for in most algorithms. A correction must consider the power transmitted by higher-order modes. Modal solutions, using reference plane independence, for a single top air gap between the material sample and the waveguide wall, are also presented. Characterization is performed on samples of acrylic and rubberized magnetic radar absorbing material. Calculation of the complex permittivity and permeability of shielding material, within 10% of the true value, was achieved …

Sub-Surface Navigation Using Very-Low Frequency Electromagnetic Waves, Alan L. Harner

Theses and Dissertations

This research proposes two schemes utilizing very-low frequency (VLF) electromagnetic waves to navigate underground. The first scheme consists of using above-ground beacon transmitters to broadcast VLF signals to an underground mobile receiver which uses methods such as triangulation and trilateration to obtain a position solution. The second scheme consists of using above-ground reference receivers along with an underground mobile receiver to form time-difference- of-arrival measurements of incoming VLF signals of opportunity, such as lightning strike emissions, to calculate a position solution. The objective of this thesis is to develop positioning algorithms and use simulations as a tool to characterize the …

Exploring Hardware Based Primitives To Enhance Parallel Security Monitoring In A Novel Computing Architecture, Stephen D. Mott

Theses and Dissertations

This research explores how hardware-based primitives can be implemented to perform security-related monitoring in real-time, offer better security, and increase performance compared to software-based approaches. In doing this, we propose a novel computing architecture, derived from a contemporary shared memory architecture, that facilitates efficient security-related monitoring in real-time, while keeping the monitoring hardware itself safe from attack. This architecture is flexible, allowing security to be tailored based on the needs of the system. We have developed a number of hardware-based primitives that fit into this architecture to provide a wide array of monitoring capabilities. A number of these primitives provide …

Assessment Of Optical Turbulence Profiles Derived From Probabilistic Climatology, Brett W. Wisdom

Theses and Dissertations

This research effort assesses the performance of the High Energy Laser End-to-End Operational Simulation (HELEEOS) Climatological C²_n optical turbulence model. Path-integrated C²_n values of two HELEEOS optical turbulence pro les at 3 distinct operational altitudes are compared to values determined from measured thermosonde data. HELEEOS desert and mid-latitude sites are selected from the Extreme and Percentile Environmental Reference Tables (ExPERT) database for comparison to the thermosonde data. Statistical equivalence of the two datasets is determined through a Design of Experiments (DOE) factorial test to within 80% confidence. The HELEEOS profiles are shown to be equivalent to …

Investigation Of Cdznte Crystal Defects Using Scanning Probe Microscopy, Goutam Koley, J. Liu, K. C. Mandal

Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Use Of Two-Way Time Transfer Measurements To Improve Geostationary Satellite Navigation, Benjamin G. Dainty

Theses and Dissertations

An emerging use of GPS is to provide accurate navigation information for satellites in orbit. The GPS satellites are designed to provide service to terrestrial users, so the antenna array points directly towards the Earth and uses a narrow primary beamwidth. Because GEO altitudes are well above the GPS constellation, the Earth occludes most of the GPS signals to the satellite. Decreased satellite visibility is debilitating, as GPS navigation requires at least four visible satellites to determine position. To assist with the visibility problem, the receiver can look at the GPS satellite transmit antenna side lobes, but this does not …

Condition Reporting And Resolution, J. M. Pesek, S. A. Wade

Publications (YM)

This procedure facilitates a safety conscious work environment by providing a mechanism for employees to make management aware of existing and potential conditions. This procedure establishes the responsibilities and process to be used to ensure that conditions related to, but not limited to, the environment, safety, health, waste isolation, operations, security, or quality of items and services associated with Office of Civilian Radioactive Waste Management (OCRWM) work activities are promptly identified, controlled, evaluated, and corrected as soon as practical. This procedure describes the process flow, controls, interfaces, and requirements for condition identification and resolution. This includes adverse conditions as well …

A Study Of Rootkit Stealth Techniques And Associated Detection Methods, Daniel D. Nerenberg

Theses and Dissertations

In today's world of advanced computing power at the fingertips of any user, we must constantly think of computer security. Information is power and this power is had within our computer systems. If we cannot trust the information within our computer systems then we cannot properly wield the power that comes from such information. Rootkits are software programs that are designed to develop and maintain an environment in which malware may hide on a computer system after successful compromise of that computer system. Rootkits cut at the very foundation of the trust that we put in our information and subsequent …

The Role Of Ultrasound Cavitation In Liposome Size Reduction, William G. Pitt, Eric S. Richardson, Dixon J. Woodbury

Faculty Publications

Liposome size is a vital parameter of many quantitative biophysical studies. Sonication, or exposure to ultrasound, is used widely to manufacture artificial liposomes, yet little is known about the mechanism by which liposomes are affected by ultrasound. Cavitation, or the oscillation of small gas bubbles in a pressure-varying field, has been shown to be responsible for many biophysical effects of ultrasound on cells. Collapse cavitation is manifested in the acoustic spectrum by an f/2 subharmonic and an increase in broadband noise. In this study, we attempted to correlate the presence of cavitation with a decrease in liposome size. Lipid suspensions …

Information Management Principles Applied To The Ballistic Missile Defense System, John M. Koehler Ii

Theses and Dissertations

Information systems (IS) have evolved over the last 50 plus years from individual components with single functionality to grand architectures that integrate multiple individual business functions into global organizational enterprises. Similarly several military systems with the single mission of missile defense have evolved in service stovepipes, and are now being integrated into a national and global missile defense architecture. The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) is currently tasked with developing an integrated Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS) capable of defending against all ranges of ballistic missiles in all phases of flight in defense of the homeland, our deployed forces, and our …

Distributed Fault-Tolerant Quality Of Service Routing In Hybrid Directional Wireless Networks, Larry C. Llewellyn Ii

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis presents a distributed fault-tolerant routing protocol (EFDCB) for QoS supporting hybrid mobile ad hoc networks with the aim of mitigating QoS disruption time when network failures occur. The experimental design presented in this thesis describes 22 experiments aimed at illustrating EFDCB's ability to handle fault-tolerance. The interpreted results show that EFDCB excels over a global rerouting protocol at this challenge which is the goal of this work.

Biological Cell Identification By Integrating Micro-Fluidics, Electrical Impedance Spectroscopy And Stochastic Estimation, Karl R. Schwenn

Theses and Dissertations

The integration of micro-fluidics, electrical impedance spectroscopy and stochastic estimation will lead to a device with enhanced detection capabilities. The goal of this thesis was to build a micro-fluidic electrical impedance measurement device that can be used in combination with a stochastic estimator to accurately identify living cells. A microdevice capable of making impedance measurements on individual living cells was designed and built using a series of standard microelectronic fabrication techniques. A microchannel was patterned in SU-8 photoresist between two gold microelectrodes on a two inch Pyrex 7740 wafer. The design process, the fabrication techniques for the microchannel, the fluid …

One-Dimensional Performance Modeling Of Centrifugal Flow Vaned Diffusers, Jamin J. Bitter

Theses and Dissertations

The Two Element in Series (TEIS) and Two Zone models stand out as powerful tools that enable deeper understanding of compressor stage designs after they have been tested. The insights gained from these investigations have aided in improving new stage designs. Up to now, it has only been possible to use the TEIS and Two Zone models for analysis of test data due to the inability to predict the four required input parameters for untested machines. Empirical models for the TEIS and Two Zone model input parameters, ETAa5, ETAb5, Chi5, and DELTA5p, for two different types of vaned diffusers, channel …

Effective Mobile Routing Through Dynamic Addressing, Heungsoon Park

Theses and Dissertations

Military communications has always been an important factor in military victory and will surely play an important part in future combat. In modern warfare, military units are usually deployed without existing network infrastructure. The IP routing protocol, designed for hierarchical networks cannot easily be applied in military networks due to the dynamic topology expected in military environments. Mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs) represent an appropriate network for small military networks. But, most ad-hoc routing protocols suffer from the problem of scalability for large networks. Hierarchical routing schemes based on the IP address structure are more scalable than ad-hoc routing but are …

Additional Shear Wall Values For Light Weight Steel Framing, Reynaud Serrette, Jose Encalada, Georgi Hall, Brandon Matchen, Hoang Nguygen, Alexander Williams

American Iron and Steel Institute (AISI) Specifications, Standards, Manuals and Research Reports (1946 - present)

This report presents the results of 16 monotonic and 28 cyclic tests of flat strap X-braced walls, steel sheathed shear walls, high aspect ratio shear walls and shear walls framed with 54-mil and 43-mil studs. The findings provided a basis for continued research and development efforts, leading to the establishment of provisions for cold-formed steel-framed diagonal strap braced walls and Type I shear walls.

Flight Physician - March, 2007, Civil Aviation Medical Association

Browse all Civil Aviation Medical Association Newsletters

A sixteen page newsletter of the Civil Aviation Medical Association. The newsletter provided news about civil aviation medicine and information related to the organization.

Priorities For Energy Efficiency For Home Construction In Florida, Florida Solar Energy Center, Robin Vieira

FSEC Energy Research Center®

Below we provide the priorities for obtaining an energy efficient building in Florida.

Random Test Data Generation For Java Classes Annotated With Jml Specifications, Yoonsik Cheon, Carlos E. Rubio-Medrano

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

The hidden states of objects create a barrier to designing and generating test data automatically. For example, the state of an object has to be established indirectly through a sequence of method invocations. For a non-trivial class, however, it is extremely unlikely that a randomly-chosen sequence of method invocations can construct an object successfully, as each invocation has to satisfy the state invariants. Nonetheless, automated random testing can reduce the cost of testing dramatically and has potential for finding errors that are difficult to find in other ways because it eliminates the subjectiveness in constructing test data. We propose a …

Interval Approach To Preserving Privacy In Statistical Databases: Related Challenges And Algorithms Of Computational Statistics, Luc Longpre, Gang Xiang, Vladik Kreinovich, Eric Freudenthal

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In many practical situations, it is important to store large amounts of data and to be able to statistically process the data. A large part of the data is confidential, so while we welcome statistical data processing, we do not want to reveal sensitive individual data. If we allow researchers to ask all kinds of statistical queries, this can lead to violation of people's privacy. A sure-proof way to avoid these privacy violations is to store ranges of values (e.g., between 40 and 50 for age) instead of the actual values. This idea solves the privacy problem, but it leads …

Teaching And Learning Dc‐Dc Converter Design Using Mathcad, Taufik

Electrical Engineering

This paper presents an approach for teaching and learning dc-dc converter design using MathCAD. MathCAD provides advantages that greatly improve teaching and learning process especially when long and complicated design equations are involved such as those found in dc-dc converters. A design example using Excel is presented and then compared with the same example using MathCAD. Experience learned from using MathCAD in power electronic courses at Cal Poly will be discussed in this paper.

A Multidisciplinary Design Project In Energy Conversion Electromagnetics Course, Ali Shaban, Ahmad Nafisi, Fred Depiero, Taufik

Electrical Engineering

This paper presents a work-in-progress on a new multidisciplinary design project for an Energy Conversion Electromagnetics course at Cal Poly State University. The project is intended to strengthen the skills of electrical and mechanical engineering students by performing design tasks in a multidisciplinary environment. Concurrently, this new design project is implemented to fulfill ABET criterion 3d. The content and format of the project will be described in this paper. Assessments planned for the project will also be discussed.

Accessibility Of Home Blood Pressure Monitors For Blind And Visually Impaired People, Mark M. Uslan, Darren M. Burton, Thomas E. Wilson, Steven Taylor, Bruce S. Chertow, Jack E. Terry

Physics Faculty Research

Background: The prevalence of hypertension comorbid with diabetes is a significant health care issue. Use of the home blood pressure monitor (HBPM) for aiding in the control of hypertension is noteworthy because of benefits that accrue from following a home measurement regimen. To be usable by blind and visually impaired patients, HBPMs must have speech output to convey all screen information, an easily readable visual display, identifiable controls that are easy to use, and an accessible user manual.

Methods: Data on the physical aspects and the features and functions of nine Food and Drug Administration-approved HBPMs (eight of which were …

Damage Detection In Ambient Vibration Using Proportional Flexibility Matrix With Incomplete Measured Dofs, Zhongdong Duan, Guirong Yan, Jinping Ou, Billie F. Spencer

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Structural Damage Detections based on the Changes of Dynamic Properties Are a Major Concern Tor Structural Health Monitoring. in This Paper. Efforts Are Made to Extend the Flexibility-Based Damage Localization Methods, Especially the Damage Locating Vector (DLV) Method, to the Case of Ambient Vibration with Incomplete Measured Degree of Freedom, Where Flexibility Matrices Are Not Available. First, the Method to Assemble a Proportional Flexibility Matrix (PFM) with Arbitrarily Scaled Modal Shapes of Full Measured Degrees of Freedom (DOF) is Introduced. the PFM is within a Scalar Multiplier to the Real Flexibility Matrix, and the Multiplier is Shown to Be the …

Performance Characteristics Of A Therapeutic Ultrasound Wire Waveguide, Graham Gavin, Garrett Mcguinness, Finbar Dolan, M.S. Hashmi

Articles

Therapeutic ultrasound angioplasty has been investigated, clinically, by a number of researchers and represents a potentially promising therapy for the treatment of atherosclerotic lesions. To date, there has been no detailed analysis of the effect of mechanical design parameters, such as wire geometry or damping characteristics, on wire waveguide performance. An apparatus capable of delivering therapeutic ultrasound down small diameter nickel–titanium (NiTi) wire waveguides is described. The output peak-to-peak (p–p) displacements at the distal tip of a 1.0mm diameter waveguide were measured experimentally, by means of an optical microscope and image analysis software. The output was measured for a range …

Analysis Of Fat Intake Based On The U.S. Department Of Agriculture’S 1994–96, 1998 Continuing Survey Of Food Intakes By Individuals (Csfii), U.S. Environmental Protection Agency

United States Environmental Protection Agency: Publications

Many chemicals found in the environment tend to accumulate in fatty tissue. Assessing potential risks from these chemicals in food requires knowledge of dietary habits and the amount of fat present in various types of foods. The National Center for Environmental Assessment of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) Office of Research and Development has conducted an analysis of fat consumption across the U.S. population. The analysis used data derived from the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s 1994–96 Continuing Survey of Food Intakes by Individuals (CSFII) and its 1998 Supplemental Children’s Survey and the EPA’s Food Commodity Intake Database (FCID). Percentiles …

Thermoeconomics Of Seasonal Latent Heat Storage System, Yaşar Demirel, H. Hüseyin Öztürk

Papers in Thermal Mechanics

A simple thermoeconomic analysis is performed for a seasonal latent heat storage system for heating a greenhouse. The system consists of three units that are a set of 18 packed-bed solar air heaters, a latent heat storage tank with 6,000 kg of technical grade paraffin wax as phase-changing material, and a greenhouse of 180m2. The cost rate balance for the output of a unit is used to estimate the specific cost of exergy for a yearly operation. Based on the cost rate of exergy, fixed capital investment, operating cost, and economic data, approximate cash-flow diagrams have been prepared. The systems …

Real-Time System Identification For Impact-Based Part Positioning, Laine Mears, Jeannie Falcon

Publications

Simplified part positioning in manufacturing has been achieved using pushing or tapping actuation in place of more complex pick-and-place systems. However, positioning by impact introduces a new source of uncertainty: interfacial frictional effects of sliding, which can result in an uncontrollable and often poorlypredictable actuation distance. The described work provides a friction-based dynamic model of the sliding distance after impact that is used to predict static friction characteristics. A prototype system is simulated and validation data used to improve the model. A control algorithm is also described, tested and validated over a range of actuated masses.

Three Prosodic Features That Cue Back-Channel Feedback In Northern Mexican Spanish, Anais G. Rivera, Nigel G. Ward

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In order to demonstrate attentiveness during a conversation it is generally necessary for the listener to provide back-channel feedback. To some extent, the times when back-channel feedback is welcome are determined by the speaker and conveyed to the listener with prosodic cues. In this study we sought to identify the cues used for this purpose in Northern Mexican Spanish. Based on quantitative analysis of a corpus of unstructured conversations, we found three cues, of which the most common is a pitch downslope followed by a pitch rise accompanied by a rate reduction on the last syllable and a drop in …