Engineering Commons^™

Task Analysis, Modeling, And Automatic Identification Of Elemental Tasks In Robot-Assisted Laparoscopic Surgery, Lavie Pinchas Golenberg

Wayne State University Dissertations

Robotic microsurgery provides many advantages for surgical operations, including tremor filtration, an increase in dexterity, and smaller incisions. There is a growing need for a task analyses on robotic laparoscopic operations to understand better the tasks involved in robotic microsurgery cases. A few research groups have conducted task observations to help systems automatically identify surgeon skill based on task execution. Their gesture analyses, however, lacked depth and their class libraries were composed of ambiguous groupings of gestures that did not share contextual similarities.

A Hierarchical Task Analysis was performed on a four-throw suturing task using a robotic microsurgical platform. Three …

Causal Product Knowledge Management, Yun Seon Kim

Wayne State University Dissertations

The US engineering industry base is facing a significant loss of knowledge due to large numbers of employees retiring in the next decade. Problems in various product developments including product design may arise when the expertise is no longer available or the knowledge is forgotten. Also, most of product design knowledge is not reusable, because product design knowledge in an organization remains un-codified. Generally, knowledge-based system can solve or infer these problems. However, knowledge-based systems have been developed solely through the use of rule-based approach, which allows for easy modeling of expert reasoning, but such an approach is not general …

Examination Of Factors Affecting The Frequency, Response Time, And Clearance Time Of Incidents On Freeways, Indrajit Ghosh

Wayne State University Dissertations

Traffic incidents are the primary cause of non-recurrent congestion in urban areas, resulting in reductions in roadway capacity and significant safety hazards to other motorists, as well as first responders. Many communities have initiated incident management programs that detect and respond to incidents and restore freeways to full capacity by clearing the incident scene as soon as possible. In the Detroit metro area, the Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) operates a Freeway Courtesy Patrol (FCP) program as part of its larger freeway incident management program from the Michigan Intelligent Transportation Systems (MITS) Center in downtown Detroit. The MITS Center maintains …

Flexible Pavement Rut Depth Modeling For Different Climate Zones, Asmaiel Kodan Naiel

Wayne State University Dissertations

Pavement rutting is one of the most important types of pavement distress that affect road safety and ride quality. Therefore, the primary objective of this study was to develop pavement rutting empirical models for different climate zones to predict pavement rutting on granular base based on LTPP data. Flexible pavements with granular base course were considered for this study. These models lead to better understanding of rutting phenomena and the factors that may have affect in pavement rutting. In addition, these models will help state and local transportation agencies make accurate decisions for maintenance, rehabilitation and reconstruction of pavement.

To …

Synthetic Levers Enabling Control Of Phase, Size And Morphology In Transition Metal Phosphide Nanoparticles (Fe, Ni), Elayaraja Muthuswamy

Wayne State University Dissertations

ABSTRACT

SYNTHETIC LEVERS ENABLING CONTROL OF PHASE, SIZE AND MORPHOLOGY IN TRANSITION METAL PHOSPHIDE NANOPARTICLES (FE, NI)

by

ELAYARAJA MUTHUSWAMY

May 2011

Advisor:Dr. Stephanie L. Brock

Major: Chemistry

Degree: Doctor of Philosophy

This dissertation study focuses on (1) development of a synthetic strategy to control phase in nanoscale iron phosphides; (2) extension of the developed phase control strategy to the nanoscale nickel phosphide system with simultaneous control on size and morphology and (3) illustration of the enhanced reactivity of nanoscale oxide systems.

A synthetic strategy to control phase in nanoscale iron phosphides was developed to prepare phase-pure samples of …

Design Of A Polysaccharide Derived Tissue Engineered Vascular Graft, Irina Robu

Wayne State University Dissertations

DESIGN OF A POLYSACCHARIDE DERIVED TISSUE ENGINEERED VASCULAR GRAFT

By

Irina Robu

November 2010

Advisor: Dr. Howard Matthew

Major: Chemical Engineering

Degree: Doctor of Philosophy

As the most frequent congenital anomaly and the leading cause of death, congenital heart disease is an attractive target for tissue engineering research. The challenging target to engineer a native blood vessel stems from the need to find substitutes for pediatric patients born with congenital defects. The tissue engineering graft functions to bring various cells of the vasculature in close proximity to one another to enable intercellular signaling which facilitates cell adhesion, migration and differentiation. …

Raman Spectroscopic Modeling Of T- Lymphocyte Activation And Detection Of Acute Renal Allograft Rejection, Kristian L. Brown

Wayne State University Dissertations

ABSTRACT

RAMAN SPECTROSCOPIC MODELING OF T-LYMPHOCYTE ACTIVATION AND DETECTION OF ACUTE RENAL ALLOGRAFT REJECTION

By

KRISTIAN L. BROWN

2010

Advisor: Gregory Auner, PhD

Major: Biomedical Engineering

Degree: Doctor of Philosophy

Despite the advances made in the area of kidney transplantation, the disparity between the demand and available donated organs remains a dominant and unresolved issue. Given the paucity of available renal allografts the preservation of existing grafts is vital. One factor that has negatively impacted renal allograft survival is acute rejection (AR). Traditionally, kidney transplant centers have used elevations in serum creatinine as a screening tool for detecting AR. However, …

Skewed Bridge Behaviors: Experimental, Analytical, And Numerical Analysis, Bang-Jo Chun

Wayne State University Dissertations

In the US, nearly 33.5% of highway bridges are skewed. In the past, these skewed bridges have been analyzed as straight bridges. Nevertheless, there exists an extensive literature indicating the mechanical behavior of skewed bridges being quite different from their straight counterparts. In this thesis, to better understand the behavior of skewed bridges, experimental, numerical, and analytical researches have been conducted. The analytical method proposed here is the first of its kind in the skewed bridge research, and is expected to aid the bridge engineers with their design.

First, a three dimensional finite element analysis (FEA) model was developed and …

Identification Of Neuroblastoma And Its Prognostic Markers Using Raman Spectroscopy, Rachel Kast

Wayne State University Dissertations

Introduction: Neuroblastoma is the most common cancer of infancy. It is one of several peripheral nervous system tumors, including ganglioneuroma, peripheral nerve sheath tumor, and pheochromocytoma. It is commonly situated on the adrenal gland. It displays similar histology to other small round blue cell tumors, including non-Hodgkin lymphoma, rhabdomyosarcoma, and Ewing sarcoma. One method of judging neuroblastoma aggressiveness uses tumor histology factors, including mitosis-karyorrhexis index, Schwannian stromal development, degree of differentiation, and patient age. Tumor aggressiveness can also be judged based on the amplification of certain genes, including MYCN. Raman spectroscopy is a physics-based method which identifies the biochemical …

Linearized Theory Of Peridynamic States, S. A. Silling

United States Department of Energy: Publications

A state-based peridynamic material model describes internal forces acting on a point in terms of the collective deformation of all the material within a neighborhood of the point. In this paper, the response of a state-based peridynamic material is investigated for a small deformation superposed on a large deformation. The appropriate notion of a small deformation restricts the relative displacement between points, but it does not involve the deformation gradient (which would be undefined on a crack). The material properties that govern the linearized material response are expressed in terms of a new quantity called the modulus state. This determines …

Nebraska Statewide Wind Integration Study: Executive Summary April 2008 – January 2010, Enernex Corporation Knoxville, Tennessee, Ventyx Atlanta, Georgia, Nebraska Power Association Lincoln, Nebraska

United States Department of Energy: Publications

Wind generation is a source of electric energy that, in sufficient quantity, can cause concern for the operation of the bulk power system because of the variability and uncertainty of the wind. Most short-term planning and operational functions supporting the electric power grid are centered on supply resources that have capacity attributes – i.e. they can be dispatched (controlled up and down) to a specified power level for a specified period of time. The need to maintain very high levels of system reliability reinforces the preference in operations toward resources having capacity attributes. Wind generation usually has relatively low capacity …

Microbial And Mineralogical Characterizations Of Soils Collected From The Deep Biosphere Of The Former Homestake Gold Mine, South Dakota, Gurdeep Rastogi, Shariff Osman, Ravi K. Kukkadapu, Mark Engelhard, Parag A. Vaishampayan, Gary L. Andersen, Rajesh K. Sani

United States Department of Energy: Publications

A microbial census on deep biosphere (1.34 km depth) microbial communities was performed in two soil samples collected from the Ross and number 6Winze sites of the former Homestake gold mine, Lead, South Dakota using high-density 16S microarrays (PhyloChip). Soil mineralogical characterization was carried out using X-ray diffraction, X-ray photoelectron, and Mössbauer spectroscopic techniques which demonstrated silicates and iron minerals (phyllosilicates and clays) in both samples. Microarray data revealed extensive bacterial diversity in soils and detected the largest number of taxa in Proteobacteria phylum followed by Firmicutes and Actinobacteria. The archael communities in the deep gold mine environments were …

Microbial Reduction Of Uranium Under Iron- And Sulfate-Reducing Conditions: Effect Of Amended Goethite On Microbial Community Composition And Dynamics, H.S. Moon, L. Mcguinness, Ravi K. Kukkadapu, A.D. Peacock, John Komlos, L.J. Kerkhof, P.E. Long, Peter R. Jaffe

United States Department of Energy: Publications

There is a growing need for a better understanding of the biogeochemical dynamics involved in microbial U(VI) reduction due to an increasing interest in using biostimulation via electron donor addition as a means to remediate uranium contaminated sites. U (VI) reduction has been observed to be maximized during iron-reducing conditions and to decrease upon commencement of sulfate-reducing conditions. There are many unknowns regarding the impact of iron/sulfate biogeochemistry on U(VI) reduction. This includes Fe(III) availability as well as the microbial community changes, including the activity of iron-reducers during the uranium biostimulation period even after sulfate reduction becomes dominant. Column experiments …

Confinement Resonances In Photoionization Of Xe@C+60, A. L. D. Kilcoyne, A. Aguilar, A. Muller, S. Schippers, C. Cisneros, G. Alna’Washi, N. B. Aryal, K. K. Baral, D. A. Esteves, C. M. Thomas, R. A. Phaneuf

United States Department of Energy: Publications

Experimental evidence is presented for confinement resonances associated with photoabsorption by a Xe atom in a C₆₀ cage. The giant 4d resonance in photoionization of Xe is predicted to be redistributed into four components due to multipath interference of photoelectron waves reflected by the cage. The measurements were made in the photon energy range 60–150 eV by merging a beam of synchrotron radiation with a mass/charge selected Xe@C⁺₆₀ ion beam. The phenomenon was observed in the Xe@C³⁺₅₈ product ion channel.

Effects From Filtration, Capping Agents, And Presence/Absence Of Food On The Toxicity Of Silver Nanoparticles To Daphnia Magna, H. Joel Allen, Christopher A. Impellitteri, Dana A. Macke, J. Lee Heckman, Helen C. Poynton, James M. Lazorchak, Shekar Govindaswamy, Deborah L. Roose, Mallikarjuna N. Nadagouda

United States Environmental Protection Agency: Publications

Relatively little is known about the behavior and toxicity of nanoparticles in the environment. Objectives of work presented here include establishing the toxicity of a variety of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) to Daphnia magna neonates, assessing the applicability of a commonly used bioassay for testing AgNPs, and determining the advantages and disadvantages of multiple characterization techniques for AgNPs in simple aquatic systems. Daphnia magna were exposed to a silver nitrate solution and AgNPs suspensions including commercially available AgNPs (uncoated and coated), and laboratory-synthesized AgNPs (coated with coffee or citrate). The nanoparticle suspensions were analyzed for silver concentration (microwave acid digestions), size …

Persistent Organic Pollutants In Fish Tissue In The Mid-Continental Great Rivers Of The United States, Karen A. Blocksom, David M. Walters, Terri M. Jicha, James M. Lazorchak, Theodore R. Angradi, David W. Bolgrien

United States Environmental Protection Agency: Publications

Great rivers of the central United States (Upper Mississippi, Missouri, and Ohio rivers) are valuable economic and cultural resources, yet until recently their ecological condition has not been well quantified. In 2004– 2005, as part of the Environmental Monitoring and Assessment Program for Great River Ecosystems (EMAPGRE), we measured legacy organochlorines (OCs) (pesticides and polychlorinated biphenyls, PCBs) and emerging compounds (polybrominated diphenyl ethers, PBDEs) in whole fish to estimate human and wildlife exposure risks from fish consumption. PCBs, PBDEs, chlordane, dieldrin and dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) were detected in most samples across all rivers, and hexachlorobenzene was detected in most Ohio River …

Test 1974: John Deere 6100d, 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 …

Biological Opinion On The Operation Of The Missouri River Main Stem System, Operation And Maintenance Of The Missouri River Bank Stabilization And Navigation Project, And Operation Of The Kansas River Reservoir System

United States Army Corps of Engineers, Omaha District

This Annual Report summarizes implementation efforts in response to the Biological Opinion on the Operation of the Missouri River Main Stem System, Operation and Maintenance of the Missouri River Bank Stabilization and Navigation Project, and Operation of the Kansas River Reservoir System. The document improves upon the previous annual Biological Opinion (BiOp) compliance reports by incorporating:

• The first combined U.S. Fish and Wildlife (USFWS) and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) report documenting recovery efforts on the Missouri River satisfying reporting requirements of the 2003 Amended BiOp on the Operation of the Missouri River Main Stem System (System), Operation …

Bottom Flange Reinforcement In Nu I-Girders, George Morcous Ph.D., Kromel Hanna Ph.D., Maher K. Tadros Ph.D., P.E.

Mid-America Transportation Center: Final Reports and Technical Briefs

The 1996 edition of AASHTO Standard Specifications for Highway Bridges stated that nominal confinement reinforcement be placed to enclose prestressing steel in the bottom flange of bridge girders from girder ends to at least a distance equal to the girder’s height. The 2004 edition of AASHTO LRFD Bridge Design Specifications changed the distance over which the confinement reinforcement was to be distributed from 1.0h to 1.5h, and gave minimum requirements for the amount of steel to be used, No.3 bars, and their maximum spacing, not to exceed 6.” Research was undertaken to study what impact, if any, confinement reinforcement had …

Load Rating Of Complex Bridges, George Morcous Ph.D., Kromel Hanna Ph.D., Maher K. Tadros Ph.D., P.E.

Mid-America Transportation Center: Final Reports and Technical Briefs

The National Bridge Inspection Standards require highway departments to inspect, evaluate, and determine load ratings for structures defined as bridges located on all public roads. Load rating of bridges is performed to determine the live load that structures can safely carry at a given structural condition. Bridges are rated for three types of loads, design loads, legal loads, and permit loads, which is a laborious and time-consuming task as it requires the analysis of the structure under different load patterns. Several tools are currently available to assist bridge engineers to perform bridge rating in a consistent and timely manner. However, …

Study Of Rf Propagation Characteristics For Wireless Sensor Networks In Railroad Environments, Hamid Sharif, Michael Hempel

Mid-America Transportation Center: Final Reports and Technical Briefs

The freight railroad industry in North America is exerting efforts to leverage Wireless Sensor Networks to monitor systems and components on railcars. This allows fault detection and accident prevention even while a train is moving. Railcars, constructed mostly of ferrous materials such as steel, are expected to severely impact signal propagation. To better understand this effect we first evaluated the signal characteristics when sensor nodes are placed in various locations around railcars. We used EM-Field modeling and evaluation techniques to obtain these results and found that node placement selection is critical for the node’s communication distance. As a second research …

Performance Measures Of Warm Asphalt Mixtures For Safe And Reliable Freight Transportation, Hosin "David" Lee Ph.D., P.E., Yongjoo "Thomas" Kim

Mid-America Transportation Center: Final Reports and Technical Briefs

Warm mix asphalt (WMA) is an emerging technology that can allow asphalt to flow at a lower temperature for mixing, placing and compaction. The advantages of WMA include reduced fuel consumption, less carbon dioxide emission, longer paving season, longer hauling distance, reduced oxidation of asphalt, early opening to traffic and a better working environment in the field. In the United States, WMA has become popular in recent years. However, to provide a safe and reliable highway for heavier truck traffic with a high tire pressure, WMA mixtures must meet requirements for strength, stiffness, rutting, and moisture resistance.

WMA mixtures with …

Extending Asphalt Pavement Life Using Thin Whitetopping, Mustaque Hossain, Sharmin Sultana

Mid-America Transportation Center: Final Reports and Technical Briefs

Due to budget constraints, many highway agencies are becoming interested in pavement preservation or rehabilitation rather than reconstruction to ensure pavement is in serviceable condition. Thin whitetopping (TWT) is the process of rehabilitating distressed asphalt concrete (AC) pavements by using a concrete overlay. This study was done to develop a design catalog for existing AC pavements to be overlaid with TWT. The finite element (FE) analysis was performed with SolidWorks, which is the 3-D FE software program used to develop this design catalog. The design considered different TWT thicknesses, existing AC layer thickness and modulus, the bonding condition between TWT …

Assessing The Damage Potential In Pretensioned Bridges, Caused By Increased Truck Loads Due To Freight Movements (Phase I), Robert J. Peterman, Steven Hammerschmidt

Mid-America Transportation Center: Final Reports and Technical Briefs

When evaluating the condition of existing bridges determining in situ stresses in the members provides valuable information about the condition of the structures. In this study, a method of surface strain relief was investigated whereby the change in strain at the surface of concrete members is used to determine the in situ stress. The method involved mounting a linear electrical-resistance strain gage along the axis of maximum stress, coring around the gage, and then relating the change in strain to the corresponding stress in the member. Members were fabricated and varying stresses were applied in order to determine the accuracy …

Characteristics And Contributory Causes Related To Large Truck Crashes (Phase I) -Fatal Crashes, Sundanda Dissanayake Ph.D., P.E.

Mid-America Transportation Center: Final Reports and Technical Briefs

One-ninth of all traffic fatalities in the United States have involved large trucks in the past five years, although large trucks contributed to only 3% of registered vehicles and 7% of vehicle miles travelled. This contrasting proportion indicates that truck crashes in general tend to be more severe than other crashes though they constitute a smaller sector of vehicles on the road. To study this issue, fatal crash data from the FARS was used to analyze characteristics and factors contributing to truck-involved crashes. Driver, vehicle, and crash-related contributory causes were identified, and as an extension the likelihood of occurrence of …

Improving Freight Fire Safety: Assessment Of The Effectiveness Of Mist-Controlling Additives In Mitigating Crash-Induced Diesel Fires, Albert Ratner Ph.D.

Mid-America Transportation Center: Final Reports and Technical Briefs

Adding long chained polymers to diesel has been proposed as a method to prevent crash fires by arresting the break-up of diesel fuel into a fine mist in transportation related accidents. The effect of such additives on the flow properties of diesel was investigated by studying the impact of poly-butadiene and diesel blend drops on a solid surface using high speed imaging. The addition of the polymer imparted shear-thinning behavior to diesel, and the base viscosities increased rapidly with polymer concentration. Four concentrations of the polymer were tested at three different impact speeds under atmospheric pressure. Maximum spread factors and …

Understanding The Molecular Dynamics Of Ypel3 And Fhit Gene Expression, Kevin Daniel Kelley

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

A comprehensive understanding of the molecular signaling pathways that regulate cell growth and proliferation is essential in the realization of new therapeutic options to facilitate early detection and eradication of malignancy. Understanding the transcriptional regulation of the YPEL3 and FHIT genes forms the basis of this dissertation. YPEL3, or Yippee-like 3, is a newly identified p53 target gene that inhibits tumor cell growth and is thus itself, a novel tumor suppressor gene. FHIT, or Fragile histidine triad, is a well known tumor suppressor gene and is regulated at the transcriptional level by another growth inhibitory protein, FOXO3a, a Forkhead box …

Statistics Of The Received Power For Free Space Optical Channels, Stephen D. Lyke

Dissertations, Master's Theses and Master's Reports - Open

Free space optical (FSO) communication links can experience extreme signal degradation due to atmospheric turbulence induced spatial and temporal irradiance fuctuations (scintillation) in the laser wavefront. In addition, turbulence can cause the laser beam centroid to wander resulting in power fading, and sometimes complete loss of the signal. Spreading of the laser beam and jitter are also artifacts of atmospheric turbulence. To accurately predict the signal fading that occurs in a laser communication system and to get a true picture of how this affects crucial performance parameters like bit error rate (BER) it is important to analyze the probability density …

Proposed Implementation Of A Cottonwood Management Plan Along Six Priority Segments Of The Missouri River

United States Army Corps of Engineers, Omaha District

The Missouri River originates in the Rocky Mountains of south-central Montana and flows approximately 2,341 miles through seven states, ending at its confluence with the Mississippi River near St. Louis, Missouri. The plains cottonwood (Populus deltoides) was once the dominant floodplain vegetation in the Missouri River ecosystem (Corps 2006a). Natural cottonwood regeneration has largely ceased along the Missouri River following the construction of the Missouri River Mainstem Reservoir System (System) and Bank Stabilization and Navigation Project (BSNP). The reduction in the number of young cottonwoods to replace older cottonwoods concerns biologists because a variety of plant and wildlife …

Modeling The Effect Of Moisture On Resilient Modulus Of Untreated Reclaimed Asphalt Pavement, Mohamed Attia, Magdy Abdelrahman

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

The use of reclaimed asphalt pavement (RAP) as a base layer is increasing as quality aggregate becomes scarcer and more expensive. Moisture content is known to have a great impact on the resilient modulus (M_R) of granular materials, and several researchers have devoted effort to develop and verify analytical models to describe that impact. Limited work has been done to quantify the effect of moisture content on RAP as a base layer. It has not been determined whether the existence of aged binder will allow designers to use the same analytical models developed for granular materials. This study …