Engineering Commons^™

Iscomatrix™ Adjuvant Links Innate And Adaptive Immune Responses, Debbie Drane

Vaccine Technology III

The ISCOMATRIX™ adjuvant has antigen delivery and presentation properties as well as immunomodulatory capabilities which combine to provide enhanced and accelerated immune responses. The responses are broad, including a range of sub classes of antibodies as well as both CD4+ and CD8+ T cells. A range of ISCOMATRIX™ vaccines (ISCOMATRIX™ adjuvant combined with antigen) have now been tested in clinical trials and have been shown to be generally safe and well tolerated as well as immunogenic, generating both antibody and T cell responses.

The mechanisms by which ISCOMATRIX™ adjuvant facilitates its immune effects is the scope of significant study and …

Clinical Development Of Formulated Therapeutic And Prophylactic Dna-Based Vaccines, Alain Rolland

Vaccine Technology III

Over the recent years, plasmid DNA vaccines have reached licensure against infectious hematopoietic necrosis virus in farmed salmon (Canada), West Nile virus in horses and metastatic melanoma in dogs (United States). A number of approaches are currently evaluated in clinical trials to enhance the potency of DNA vaccines in humans, including formulation of DNA with delivery systems and adjuvants as well as administration of DNA with devices. This presentation will report on the development of TransVaxTM, a poloxamer-formulated therapeutic DNA vaccine against human cytomegalovirus (CMV) in transplant patients. A vaccine that increases CMV-specific T-cell responses could reduce CMV reactivation after …

Development Of Recombinant Protein Based Chemical Conjugate Malaria Vaccines Targeting The Pre-Erythrocytic Stage, Transmission Blocking, Or Both, David L. Narum, Nicholas Macdonald, David Jones, Ruth Ellis, Yimin Wu, Patrick E. Duffy

Vaccine Technology III

The development of a Plasmodium falciparum malaria vaccine is critical for future control and elimination programs. Recombinant protein based chemical conjugate vaccines, covering different parasite stages, are being developed due to complexity of the parasite and sub-optimal immunogenicity of recombinant malaria proteins in humans, respectively. Chemical conjugation of recombinant malaria proteins to carrier proteins improves their immunogenicity in animal studies. A transmission blocking vaccine comprised of the ookinete protein Pfs25 chemically conjugated to Pseudomonas aeruginosa ExoProtein A (EPA) is currently being developed for pilot scale cGMP production. Bulk lots of Pfs25 and EPA have already been produced and released following …

The Challenge Of Developing New Generation Vaccines For Control And Eradication Of Foot And Mouth Disease In South America, Susana Levy

Vaccine Technology III

Foot and mouth disease (FMD) is a highly infectious viral disease that affects food producing animals such as cattle, pigs and sheep. The FMD status given by the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) has a huge financial impact on countries that have economies based on meat trade. In the past 15 years the MERCOSUR countries (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay) have consolidated industrial processes to supply the region with safe and efficacious vaccines to prevent FMD in livestock. Control and eradication programs rely heavily on compulsory vaccination with multivalent whole virus inactivated vaccines. Currently, vaccines are industrially obtained by …

Ultra-Scale Down Studies Of Human Cell Bioprocessing For A Prostate Cancer Vaccine Therapy - The Impact Of Capillary Shear, Juan Pablo Acosta Martinez, Katherine Lawrence, Carol Chu Mike Hoare, Stephen Ward

Vaccine Technology III

The scale-up and manufacturing of therapies based on intact whole cells presents a major challenge for development scientists and engineers due to the stress-reactive nature of these cells. The administrated cells may be characterized in terms of their membrane integrity and their surface markers and eventually their biopotency. The challenge is to process the cells at various scales and in a way which maintains these cell properties. Also during formulation the presence of cytokines produced by cells prior to their inactivation is a critical factor. This poster presents an approach to allow the rapid characterization of human cell lines in …

Establishing A Platform For Spray Drying Inhalable Vaccines In South Africa, Willem Germishuizen, L Venter, A Khosa, F Mudau, P.B. Fourie, B Pulliam, M Kabadi, A Schiermeier, D.A . Edwards

Vaccine Technology III

Mycobacterium bovis BCG is the current vaccine for tuberculosis (TB). However, BCG as it is currently administered shows highly variable efficacy in protecting adults against TB. The natural route of infection of TB is via inhalation of bacilli-containing aerosols and it is postulated that immunization by the natural route of infection may lead to a greater immunity given the fact that the lungs are the primary target of infection. By eliciting both local and systemic immune responses, it is anticipated that an inhaled form of BCG will offer greater protection against pulmonary TB.

Current commercial BCG vaccine preparations are filled …

Scale-Up Of An Intensified Process For Rad35 Adenovirus Production Using The Per.C6® Cell Substrate, Alfred Luitjens, Herman Van Herk

Vaccine Technology III

Tuberculosis is the world’s second deadliest infectious disease, with over 9 million new cases diagnosed in 2006. In collaboration with the Aeras Global Tuberculosis Vaccine Foundation, we are developing a recombinant tuberculosis adenovirus based vaccine (rAd35). Currently a series of three Phase I trials are taking place, with the first two studies indicating very promising results, safety and toleration. In November 2008 we started a Phase II study in South Africa. The manufacturing process supporting these clinical studies was developed using the PER.C6® cell substrate. With the productivity of this production process, scale-up to 10,000-liter bioreactor will be required to …

Application Of Animal-Free Recombinant Bioactive Protein Supplements To Improve The Performance Of Cell-Based Viral Vaccine Production, Kenneth Bertram, Marina Ross, Domenica Cavallaro, Larissa Chirkova, Geoffrey Francis

Vaccine Technology III

Animal cell culture for the production of viral vaccines has been performed for more than 50 years, and currently this technology is expanding rapidly to meet present and future demands of the health sector. The development and regulatory approval of continuous cell lines for manufacturing viral vaccines has brought numerous benefits to production processes. However, greater advances in the last decade have been achieved in mammalian cell production of biological therapeutics, including monoclonal antibodies, hormones, growth factors, cytokines and clotting factors. We and others have contributed to these upstream advances by improving cell culture media with the development of animal-free …

Cim Technology: Enabeling Economic Vaccine Purification, Matjaz Peterka, Franci Smrekar, Tony Brazzale, Marko Banjac, Petra Kramberger, Milos Barut, Ales Podgornik, Ales Strancar

Vaccine Technology III

Vaccines are diverse and complex biological molecules, complexes and particles. Different production technologies are used for vaccines manufacturing and every production process require somekind of vaccine purification. Purification of vaccines is technically challenging and was traditionally inefficient and partially neglected due to different economical and technical reasons. Density gradient ultracentrifugation, introduced in1960s is still a major purification step for many vaccines present on the market. As a complementary techniques, cross flow filtration and chromatography has been used. Conventional chromatography supports designed for protein purification have relatively small pore sizes with restricted access for large molecules and viruses. In addition mass …

Raw As Archival Still Image Format: A Consideration, Michael J. Bennett, F. Barry Wheeler

Published Works

Source materials like fine art, over-sized, fragile maps, and delicate artifacts have traditionally been digitally converted through the use of controlled lighting and high resolution scanners and camera backs. In addition the capture of items such as general and special collections bound monographs has recently grown both through consortial efforts like the Internet Archive's Open Content Alliance and locally at the individual institution level. These projects, in turn, have introduced increasingly higher resolution consumer-grade digital single lens reflex cameras or "DSLRs" as a significant part of the general cultural heritage digital conversion workflow. Central to the authors' discussion is the …

The Relevance Of Teaching Traditional Measurement Techniques To Undergraduate Quantity Surveying Students., Fiacra P. Mcdonnell

Articles

Measurement of quantities is a core skill which must be inherent in all graduates from Quantity Surveying courses. Many students find this subject difficult to grasp, and the learning experience can be problematic especially in the first semester of first year. This is not unique to measurement as in many cases first year students are in the process of adapting to a new stage in their life, along with attempting to master many new subjects (Cottrell, 2008). This is reinforced by Johnston (2010) who highlights the many challenges being experienced by first year students and observes that “ entering first …

Testing Guidelines For New Product Development, Derek W. Egbert

Theses and Dissertations

While many literary sources outline the product development process, few make mention of the prototyping and testing stage. This thesis suggests that because of its importance in the product development process, "Testing" should be documented as a major step and not just listed as a side note. As part of the testing step, it is suggested that standardized, in-use, and market tests be used to properly evaluate a product. While many rely solely on standardized tests to validate their products, effective in-use tests can be another vital tool that can prove the performance of the product in more specific and …

Presentation On Raw As Archival Still Image Format: A Consideration, Michael J. Bennett, F. Barry Wheeler

UConn Library Presentations

No abstract provided.

Ceas E-News 06.03.2010, College Of Engineering And Applied Sciences

College of Engineering and Applied Sciences News

The CEAS issues its own brown and gold coin to make connections

Strain Rate Sensitivity Of Nanocrystalline Au Films At Room Temperature, K Jonnalagadda, N Karanjgaokar, Joo Lien Chee, Dimitrios Peroulis

PRISM: NNSA Center for Prediction of Reliability, Integrity and Survivability of Microsystems

The effect of strain rate on the inelastic properties of nanocrystalline Au films was quantified with 0.85 and 1.76 lm free-standing microscale tension specimens tested over eight decades of strain rate, between 6 106 and 20 s1. The elastic modulus was independent of the strain rate, 66 ± 4.5 GPa, but the inelastic mechanical response was clearly rate sensitive. The yield strength and the ultimate tensile strength increased with the strain rate in the ranges 575–895 MPa and 675–940 MPa, respectively, with the yield strength reaching the tensile strength at strain rates faster than 101 s1. The activation volumes for …

Table 6.04, Mark E. Shaurette

Supplementary Content for <em>Demolition: Practices, Technology, and Management</em> <br>(ISBN 978-1-55753-567-2)

No abstract provided.

Interplanetary Gravity Assisted Trajectory Optimizer (Igato), Jason Bryan

Aerospace Engineering

Interplanetary space travel is an extremely complicated endeavor that is severely limited by our current technological advancements. The amount of energy required to transport a spacecraft from one planet to the next, or even further, is extraordinary and in some cases is even impossible given our current propulsive capabilities. Due to these complications, the search for other means of exchanging energy became imperative to future space exploration missions. One particularly powerful method that was discovered, and the most commonly used one, is referred to as planetary gravity assist. In order to plan out multiple gravity assist trajectories, complex and robust …

Autonomous Control Of The Cal Poly Motion Flight Simulator, Andrew M. Anderson

Aerospace Engineering

An autonomous controller for the Cal Poly Motion Flight Simulator was developed such that the simulated Van’s RV-7 flies a standard light aircraft traffic pattern without any human pilot input. First, an autopilot was developed in Simulink to control the aircraft’s altitude, airspeed, and heading independent of each other. The performance of the autopilot has been tested to perform with a response sufficient for precise navigation. A C++ s- function was written as a mission controller that followed a pre-programmed path around a known airport. The aircraft performs a standard left 45 degree entry into the traffic pattern, lands on …

Analysis Of F-104c World's Altitude Record Flight, William J. Day

Aerospace Engineering

No abstract provided.

Design, Fabrication, And Testing Of An Automotive Turbocharger-Based Gas Turbine Engine, John Kyle Thoma, Daniel Shehan, Benjamin Naravage, Jacob Melvin

Aerospace Engineering

A fully-functioning, self-sustaining gas turbine engine was designed and built. The engine was constructed around a Holset HE351 VGT automobile turbocharger, containing compressor and turbine assemblies on a common shaft. Other components of the engine were either purchased or designed and fabricated in-house. During initial testing of the completed engine, the turbocharger, however, was found to have extensive damage to the internal oil seals, and so the project could not be completed as planned. Instead, the combustor design and fabrication was completed for stand-alone testing. The combustion chamber was designed so that the flame tube could be easily changed out …

Alterations Of The Cal Poly Supersonic Wind Tunnel To Increase Accuracy And Prove The Absence Of Shockwaves, Garrett A. Lovell, Hector A. Gonzalez

Aerospace Engineering

The calibration and improvement of the Cal Poly supersonic wind tunnel was performed in order to create a fully functional facility for supersonic testing. While investigating possible shocks present in the wind tunnel, it was discovered that the real concern was not the tunnel but the measurement systems. Both measurement systems, pitot tube and Schlieren, were evaluated and were found to be deficient. The pitot system had so much play in it that it bent backward every time the tunnel was run invalidating the results, and giving false shock data. The Schlieren system was missing one vital component to make …

Cal Poly Flight Test Platform For Instrument Development, Kyle Schaller, Ian Muceus, Aaron Ells

Aerospace Engineering

This report summarizes a six month effort to conceptually design, develop, and build an unmanned aerial vehicle to test a boundary layer data system (BLDS) developed by Dr. Russell Westphal and his team of mechanical engineering senior design students. The project is funded by Edwards Air Force Base and the United States Air Force Research Laboratory. During the first Cal Poly quarter of project work, January 4, 2010 to March 18, 2010, the team completed a conceptual and preliminary design. During the second quarter, March 18, 2010 to June 12, 2010, the team completed the construction and initial flight test …

Practical Experience With State-Of-The-Art Technologies In Scada Systems, Beau Freeman, Charles M. Burt

BioResource and Agricultural Engineering

A Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) system is a powerful tool which, when implemented properly in irrigation districts, can lead to improved water delivery service to farms, more effective operations, reduced spill (and therefore reduced diversions), and in some cases a reduction in costs (less labor, less energy, etc.). However, widespread adoption of SCADA and automation technologies remains a technical and financial challenge for most irrigation districts. In spite of many good hardware and software products available on the market now, putting all the pieces together requires specialized expertise. Nevertheless, by following some straightforward strategies and rules of good …

Boron Carbide Based Solid State Neutron Detectors: The Effects Of Bias And Time Constant On Detection Efficiency, Nina Hong, John Mullins, Keith Foreman, Shireen Adenwalla

Shireen Adenwalla Papers

Neutron detection in thick boron carbide(BC)/n-type Si heterojunction diodes shows a threefold increase in efficiency with applied bias and longer time constants. The improved efficiencies resulting from long time constants have been conclusively linked to the much longer charge collection times in the BC layer. Neutron detection signals from both the p-type BC layer and the n-type Si side of the heterojunction diode are observed, with comparable efficiencies. Collectively, these provide strong evidence that the semiconducting BC layer plays an active role in neutron detection, both in neutron capture and in charge generation and collection.

Lean Inventory Management System For Boeing Missile Defense, Danielle Partridge

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Lean inventory management is influential for business. One of the wastes businesses aim to reduce, using lean principles, is inventory. Inventory management provides the essential tools for eliminating extra inventory and cost that is tied up in capital.

Boeing’s Ground Based Missile Defense inventory area was failing at meeting their proprietary lean manufacturing goals. There was a need for an inventory system that included: lean principles, inventory management and user-friendly capability. The goal of this project’s inventory management database process was to minimize inventory investment while still meeting functional requirements. The deliverables for this project met the needs of Boeing’s …

Ergonomic Methods To Improve Safety In The Construction Sector And Reduce Costs, Mona Barjasteh

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Many small construction companies have difficulty providing a safe working environment for their employees because of their lack of resources. There is a need to provide a manual for small construction companies employing 10 or fewer workers with the best ergonomic solutions of the top most common injuries. Accidents in the construction field are very high with nearly 175,00o nonfatal injuries and 1,121 deaths in 2002. The nonfatal cases occur 7.1 times per 100 full time workers, while serious injuries occur 2.8 times per 100 full time workers. This information reveled the importance of focusing on minor injuries in order …

Statistical Quality Control In The Health Care Industry, Roberto Arce

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

In recognition to the increased length of stay of discharge patients, deteriorating patient care and staff satisfaction in a emergency department (ED), this project was set to improve these measures without reducing staff, adding new workers, and without increasing the number of beds. Lean methods such as value stream mapping (VSM) formed the basis of the project. This tool helped identify the patient process flow through the (ED) as well as the valued added and non-value added steps of the process. This project describes value stream map development in the emergency department at a community hospital. A current-state value stream …

An Alternative To Stretch Wrap Using Triple Bottom Line, Christian Guirola

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Packaging products has always been a major sector of industries. Mass producing manufacturing companies use wooden pallets to store and transport items; these products are stacked and then secured by wrapping stretch wrap around them. The main issue with this packaging method is that millions of pounds of waste is produced. Some of the other effects include green house gas emissions during its production, limited recycling, and high packaging costs. In order to reduce the amounts of stretch wrap used by industries and distribution centers, there was a need to research and evaluate alternate methods to secure products on pallets. …

Feasibility Of Manipulating Correlated Color Temperatures With A Phosphor Converted High-Powered Light Emitting Diode White Light Source, Matthew Michael Little

Master's Theses

In this thesis we examine the feasibility of developing a white light source capable of producing colors between 2500 and 7500 Kelvin on the black-body radiator spectrum by simply adjusting amperage to a blue and ultraviolet (UV) light emitting diode (LED). The purpose of a lighting source of this nature is to better replicate daylight inside a building at a given time of day. This study analyzes the proposed light source using a 385 nm UV LED, a 457 nm blue LED, a 479 nm blue LED, a 562 nm peak cerium doped yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG:Ce) phosphor, and a …

The Effects Of Carbon, Boron And Vanadium On The Microstructural Evolution And Hardness Of Steel-Based Hardfacing Alloys, Kyle Rafa

Materials Engineering

Current hardfacing alloys provide insufficient wear resistance due to either cracking or significant material wear. To increase wear resistance of steel-based hardfacing alloys, the effects of composition on microstructure and hardness were investigated in a progression of alloys. Initially, seven new alloys were prepared varying the carbon-boron ratio with the total constant at 3 wt%. Small arc-melt cast circular ingots were produced roughly 1 x 0.5 inches. Metallography provided insufficient phase magnification, thus a SEM equipped with EDS was used, allowing for microstructure and phase composition analysis. Four distinct carbide phases were found and image analysis software allowed for carbide …