Engineering Commons^™

Calibration Of Resistance Factors For Driven Piles Using Static And Dynamic Tests, Deshinka A. Bostwick

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The field of geotechnical engineering has evolved from Allowable Stress Design (ASD) to Load Factor and Resistance Design (LRFD) which has led to a need to quantify the measures of uncertainty and the level of reliability associated with a project. The measures of uncertainty are quantified by load and resistance factors, while the level of reliability is driven by the amount of risk an owner is willing to take and is quantified by the reliability index. The load factors are defined through structural design codes, but the resistance factors have uncertainties that can be mitigated through reliability based design. The …

Development Of A Hydrologic Model For An Urban Headwater Stream: The Influence Of Pervious Surface Properties On Runoff Dynamics, Dawn A. Farver

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

A hydrologic model was developed for the Mullins Creek (MC) catchment located on the University of Arkansas campus in Fayetteville, Arkansas. The MC catchment is a small, dynamic urban stream system with a range of land use/land cover (LULC), an extensive and well-developed stormwater drainage network, and extensive urbanization (over 90% developed, and almost 50% impervious surface area (ISA)). Selected datasets provided information on the stormwater drainage network, the physical attributes of the catchment and receiving waterway (i.e. drainage area, slope, etc.), infiltration potential of soil map units, LULC, and percent ISA. These datasets were analyzed to provide input parameters …

Effects Of Operating Conditions On Removal Of Trace-Amount Testosterone By Nitrocellulose Filter Membrane, Ying Liang

Department of Environmental Engineering: Theses and Other Student Research

Hormone can be removed by membrane filtration via membrane interception, sorption and diffusion. However, the effects of operating conditions of membrane filtration on hormone removal have not been evaluated systematically. In this study, the removal of testosterone by nitrocellulose membranes under different operating conditions (e.g., initial testosterone concentrations, sample volumes, flow rates and membrane pore sizes) was investigated. ¹⁴C-labeled testosterone was used as a tracer to determine the removal of testosterone in the filtration process, and a hydrodynamic model was used to determine dispersion coefficient (D) associated with the operating conditions and radius of hormone molecule. Results indicate that …

A Performance Study Of Genetic Algorithm-Assisted Beamforming In Distributed Cognitive Radio Networks, Andrew Minturn

Department of Computer Electronics and Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Cognitive Radio (CR) is a technology that has gained much interest recently due to the increasing scarcity of the radio frequency spectrum. Large portions of the radio frequency spectrum are licensed to users who then have exclusive access to the bandwidth, and unlicensed bands can be a challenge to use due to interference from unlicensed users. Despite the seeming scarcity, tests of bands allocated by the Federal Communications Committee (FCC) to licensed and unlicensed user have shown that many are underutilized and often unoccupied by the user to whom they are licensed. CR aims to exploit this unused spectrum and …

A Study On Resource Efficient Digital Multimedia Security Measures In Mobile Devices, Prabhat Dahal

Department of Computer Electronics and Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Advanced image and video processing abilities in smart phones and digital cameras make them popular means to capture multimedia. In addition, the integration of internet into such devices users seek to capture and easily share multimedia right from their smartphone while most steganography techniques are computer based. Hence, it is of utmost importance that the multimedia be processed for steganography right within the devices for multimedia authentication.

In this thesis, we first implement steganography into mobile smart devices that can capture multimedia. For devices such as smart phones, we propose a method to hide payload bits within video frames. The …

Automated Classification Of Eeg Signals Using Component Analysis And Support Vector Machines, Priya Balasubramanian

Masters Theses

Epileptic seizures are characterized by abnormal electrical activity occurring in the brain. EEG records the seizures demonstrating changes in signal morphology. These signal characteristics, however, differ between patients as well as between different seizures in the same patient. Epilepsy is managed with anti-epileptic medications but in some extreme cases surgery might be necessary. Non-invasive surface electrode EEG measurement gives an estimate of the seizure onset but more invasive intra-cranial electrocorticogram (ECoG) are required at times for precise localization of the epileptogenic zone.

The epileptogenic zone can be described as the cortical area targeted for resection to render the patient symptom …

How Much For An Interval? A Set? A Twin Set? A P-Box? A Kaucher Interval? Towards An Economics-Motivated Approach To Decision Making Under Uncertainty, Joe Lorkowski, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

A natural idea of decision making under uncertainty is to assign a fair price to different alternatives, and then to use these fair prices to select the best alternative. In this paper, we show how to assign a fair price under different types of uncertainty.

Granularity Helps Explain Seemingly Irrational Features Of Human Decision Making, Joe Lorkowski, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Starting from well-known studies by Kahmenan and Tarsky, researchers have found many examples when our decision making -- and our decision making -- seem to be irrational. In this chapter, we show that this seemingly irrational decision making can be explained if we take into account that human abilities to process information are limited; as a result, instead of the exact values of different quantities, we operate with granules that contain these values. On several examples, we show that optimization under such granularity restriction indeed leads to observed human decision making. Thus, granularity helps explain seemingly irrational human decision making.

Study And Manipulation Of Electron Tunneling Through Quantum Dots, Pradeep Krishna Bhadrachalam

Material Science and Engineering Dissertations - Archive

Fermi-Dirac distribution is the fundamental property which governs the electron energy distribution in solids. At finite temperatures, Fermi-Dirac thermal smearing of electron energies limits the operation of many electronic, opto-electronic and spintronic devices. Examples include single electron transistors, quantum dot resonant tunnel diodes for single photon detection, and single electron turnstile devices. To overcome this intrinsic limitation of Fermi-Dirac thermal smearing, these devices have typically been operated at cryogenic temperatures. Room temperature operation of these devices could be realized, however, if the thermal smearing of electron energies could be suppressed. Until now, studies in the fields of electron-tunneling refrigerators and …

Compact Modeling Methodology Development For Thermomechanical Assessment In High-End Mobile Applications-Planar And 3d Tsv Packages, Fahad Mirza

Electrical Engineering Theses - Archive

For the last few decades, Moore's law has been driving the microelectronics industry to achieve high performance with small form-factors at a reasonable cost. The continued miniaturization of the transistors has resulted in unparalleled growth in the electronics industry. Further performance increment via size scaling; however, will not be costeffective and difficult to manufacture. To achieve further performance enhancement at a reasonable cost, advanced packaging is being leveraged. Advanced packaging technologies such as System-on-chip (SOCs), system-in-package (SiPs), and 3-D TSV ICs provide significant power and performance enhancement without having the need to migrate to the higher technology node. As planar …

Characterization Of Gan Thin Films Grown By Rf Magnetron Sputtering For Fabrication Of An Algan/Gan Hemt Biosensor, Rocio Yolanda Garza

Theses and Dissertations - UTB/UTPA

Radio-Frequency (RF) Magnetron Sputtering has been used to grow GaN thin films for future fabrication of an AlGaN/GaN HEMT biosensor. A GaN target was sputtered at various parameters on silicon and sapphire substrates, at room temperature and at elevated temperature using substrate heating and post deposition annealing treatment. The research conducted investigates the effects of sputtering gas (Argon or Nitrogen gas), RF power (40W or 50W), and pressure (4mT – 30mT) on the structural properties of the thin films. Imaging tools such as the Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS), X-ray Diffractometer (XRD), and …

Seeds Of Solutions™: An Economical & Efficient Approach Towards Power Engineering Education, Eli Alvarez

Theses and Dissertations - UTB/UTPA

Power demands are set to increase over the next twenty years; however, research shows that there may be a shortage of power engineers due to an appreciable percentage of the current power engineer workforce retiring, insufficient enrollment in power engineering programs and a lack of emphasis in power engineering at the university level. This thesis provides supporting research for future power demands, workforce and faculty shortages. Using temporary research in modern learning / teaching styles, student / teacher perceptions, educational trends and regional course offerings, this thesis describes a learning approach towards power engineering education. Designed specifically for universities with …

Scientific Application Acceleration Utilizing Heterogeneous Architectures, Edwin Weill

All Theses

Within the past decade, there have been substantial leaps in computer architectures to exploit the parallelism that is inherently present in many applications. The scientific community has benefited from the emergence of not only multi-core processors, but also other, less traditional architectures including general purpose graphical processing units (GPGPUs), field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), and Intel's many integrated cores (MICs) architecture (i.e. Xeon Phi). The popularity of the GPGPU has increased rapidly because of their ability to perform massive amounts of parallel computation quickly and at low cost with an ease of programmability. Also, with the addition of high-level programming …

Differential Protein Expression Of Caco-2 Cells Treated With Selenium Nanoparticles Compared With Sodium Selenite And Selenomethionine, Linglin Fu, Xuxia Yan, Xinming Ruan, Junda Lin, Yanbo Wang

Biomedical Engineering and Sciences Faculty Publications

The study was designed to determine the differential protein expression of Caco-2 cells treated with different forms of selenium including sodium selenite, selenomethionine (Se-Met), and selenium nanoparticles (nano-Se). Two-dimensional polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (2D-PAGE) and mass spectrometry (MS) were used to identify the differentially expressed proteins. The results indicated that seven protein spots, ubiquitin-conjugating enzyme E2 (E2), glutathione synthetases (GS), triosephosphate isomerase (TSP), T-complex protein 1 subunit zeta (TCPZ), lamin-B1, heterogeneous nuclear ribonucleoprotein F (hnRNP F), and superoxide dismutase [Cu-Zn] (Cu, Zn-SOD) were significantly different among all the groups. According to the order of control, sodium selenite, Se-Met, and Nano-Se, the …

Rapdb: The Rapid Social Application Deployment Service, Lance Tyler, Matthew Morris

Computer Science and Software Engineering

No abstract provided.

Quickbooks Self-Employed Ios Application, Braden Young

Computer Science and Software Engineering

No abstract provided.

Developing Critical Loads And Dynamic Critical Loads For Acidification For Watersheds In The Adirondack Region Of New York And Great Smoky Mountain National Park (Grsm), Qingtao Zhou

Dissertations - ALL

Critical loads (CLs) and dynamic critical loads (DCLs) are important tools for the management of ecosystems that are impacted by high sulfate, nitrate and ammonium deposition. In this study, a biogeochemical model (PnET-BGC) was applied to 20 watersheds in the Adirondack region and 12 watersheds in Great Smoky Mountain National Park (GRSM) to calculate CLs and DCLs. I evaluated ecosystem changes in response to historical and potential future changes in acidic deposition. I analyzed factors affecting CLs and DCLs for acidification in the acid impacted Constable Pond Watershed in the Adirondack region, specifically evaluating trade-offs of sulfate and nitrate deposition, …

Numerical And Experimental Investigation Of Variable Transportation Cooling For Reusable Thermal Protection Systems, Stefano Gulli

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Dissertations - Archive

This research work is focused on the numerical and experimental investigation of the transpiration cooling technique for reusable thermal protection systems. The transpiration cooling has been considered because of its higher cooling effectiveness, with respect to other active cooling techniques, in terms of minimum amount of coolant to be used and minimum interference to the external flow. An innovative approach based on the coupling of the hypersonic boundary layer with the thermal response of porous materials is used to numerically study the thermal management potential of the transpiration cooling technique. The new concept of the variable transpiration is introduced by …

An Ic Design For Wireless Batteryless Multi-Sensing Platform For Biomedical Applications, Young-Sik Seo

Electrical Engineering Dissertations - Archive

This work proposed an integrated circuit (IC) design that provides the required functionality for a wireless, batteryless implant. For biomedical applications, the physiological signals can be detected if the parameter of interest can be converted to a change in electrical parameters such as capacitance, resistance or an amperometric signal. The implantable transponder is suitable for sensors that generate one of the aforementioned analog signals. In the proposed universal platform, a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) was used to detect variations of voltage or current. Similarly, a relaxation oscillator (RO) was used to detect changes in capacitance or resistance. Thus, the VCO and …

Temperature-Dependence Of Stress-Related Phenomena, Rahmat Saptono

Material Science and Engineering Dissertations - Archive

Efforts have been made to develop a simple but physically sound model. The model was specifically proposed to capture, explain, and estimate the temperature sensitivity and strengthening mechanism phenomena in small volume material with particular reference to the roles grain boundary and surface. Model-inspired phenomenology approach was applied to reveal the key mechanisms and find directions for a more complete constitutive model. The model was developed in the limited space where diffusion is insignificant. It was assumed that the plastic flow was predominantly governed by the thermally-activated process of dislocation glide overcoming barriers. Simple mathematical functions were formulated and evaluated …

Experimental And Numerical Study Of Phase Transition Of Lifepo₄ Material In Lithium Ion Batteries, Md Noor E Alam Siddique

Material Science and Engineering Dissertations - Archive

Phase transition behavior of LiFePO4 material has been studied in this work. During electrochemical charge/discharge processes, LiFePO4 transforms into FePO4 and this electrochemically driven phase transition of the two-phase system results in a potential plateau in a battery discharge curve. Besides, battery performance, especially under high rates, depends critically on this two-phase transition. However, this phase transition mechanism in the LiFePO4 crystal structure has yet not been understood in details. Developing better understanding is essential for designing high performing, safe and stable batteries.Currently available phase transition models for LiFePO4, such as the classical `core-shrinking model' and recently the `domino cascade …

Water System For Developing Countries / Disaster Relief Made With Local Materials, Shumon Hasan

Chemistry & Biochemistry Undergraduate Honors Theses

The objective of this project was to design a water purification system that can be constructed from easily available materials, common to the particular country, and is capable of the complete water purification process.

Relationship Between Peel Force, Opening Force, And Burst Force For A Semi-Rigid Cup And Lid, Pre- And Post-Retort, Raj Navalakha

All Theses

This research determines if there is any relationship between the peel force, the opening force and the burst force for a semi-rigid cup and lid system, for pre- and post-retort conditions. It also compares the relationship (regression lines) between these forces pre- and post-retort. These seal results were studied by varying the sealing parameters of dwell time and temperature while keeping the pressure constant. Polypropylene cups and a peelable barrier retort lidding were used in this study. As compared to past research, a different peel testing technique was used to measure the peel and the opening force. The entire lid …

Compact Antennas And Arrays For Unmanned Air Systems, James Arthur Eck

Theses and Dissertations

A simple and novel dual-CP printed antenna is modelled and measured. The patch antennais small and achieves a low axial ratio without quadrature feeding. The measured pattern showsaxial ratio pattern squinting over frequency. Possible methods of improving the individual element are discussed, as well as an array technique for improving the axial ratio bandwidth. Three endfire printed antenna structures are designed, analyzed, and compared. The comparison includes an analysis of costs of production for the antenna structures in addition to their performance parameters. This analysis concludes that cost of materials primarily reduces the size of antennas for a given gain …

Characterization Of Smoothness In Wrist Rotations, Layne Hancock Salmond

Theses and Dissertations

Smoothness is a hallmark of healthy movement and has the potential to be used as a marker of recovery in rehabilitation settings. While much past research has focused on shoulder and elbow movements (reaching), little is known about movements of the wrist despite its importance in everyday life and its impairment in many neurological and biomechanical disorders. Our current lack of knowledge regarding wrist movement prevents us from improving current models, diagnosis, and treatment of wrist disorders. In particular, while movement smoothness is a well-known characteristic of reaching movements and may potentially be used to diagnose and monitor recovery from …

Modeling And Testing Of Bistable Waterbomb Base Configurations, Brandon Holbrook Hanna

Theses and Dissertations

Origami is making an impact in engineering as solutions to problems are being found by applying origami principles (eg. flat-foldability) and using specific crease patterns as inspiration. This thesis presents an in-depth analysis of a particular origami fold -- the waterbomb base -- to facilitate its use in future engineering problems. The watebomb base is of interest due to its familiarity to the origami community, simple topology (can be made by folding a single sheet of paper four times), scalability, generalizability, and interesting kinetic behavior. It can behave as a nonlinear spring as well as a one- or two-way bistable …

Crash Prediction Modeling For Curved Segments Of Rural Two-Lane Two-Way Highways In Utah, Casey Scott Knecht

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis contains the results of the development of crash prediction models for curved segments of rural two-lane two-way highways in the state of Utah. The modeling effort included the calibration of the predictive model found in the Highway Safety Manual (HSM) as well as the development of Utah-specific models developed using negative binomial regression. The data for these models came from randomly sampled curved segments in Utah, with crash data coming from years 2008-2012. The total number of randomly sampled curved segments was 1,495. The HSM predictive model for rural two-lane two-way highways consists of a safety performance function …

A Hybrid Method For Sensitivity Optimization With Application To Radio-Frequency Product Design, Abraham Lee

Theses and Dissertations

A method for performing robust optimal design that combines the efficiency of experimental designs and the accuracy of nonlinear programming (NLP) has been developed, called Search-and-Zoom. Two case studies from the RF and communications industry, a high-frequency micro-strip band-pass filter (BPF) and a rectangular, directional patch antenna, were used to show that sensitivity optimization could be effectively performed in this industry and to compare the computational efficiency of traditional NLP methods (using fmincon solver in MATLAB R2013a) and they hybrid method Search-and-Zoom. The sensitivity of the BPF's S11 response was reduced from 0.06666 at the (non-robust) nominal optimum to 0.01862 …

The Effect Of Surface Roughness On The Fretting Corrosion Of 316l Stainless Steel Biomaterial Surfaces, Aarti Shenoy

Theses - ALL

The medical device industry is still seeking answers to the mechanically-assisted corrosion (MAC) problem, which becomes increasingly important due to modularity in design. MAC manifests in various forms, some of which are fretting corrosion, crevice corrosion and stress corrosion. Several studies have been conducted to understand the causes and the factors that affect fretting corrosion. Some of the factors are the applied load, surface potential, oxide film characteristics and solution chemistry near the interface. Surface properties such as surface roughness determine the topography of the surface and the nature of asperity-asperity contact, which is a factor that would determine the …

The Effects Of Watershed Liming On Mercury Concentrations And Stocks In Soil Of Woods Lake, New York, Zhenni Xie

Theses - ALL

Abstract

In acid-impacted forests, lime has been applied to neutralize acidity and mitigate acidification of soil and surface waters. However, few studies have evaluated the effects of liming on watershed mercury processes and transport. I investigated the effects of liming on mercury, organic carbon, and sulfur concentrations and stocks in forest soil 19 years after the application of lime to the Woods Lake Watershed, Adirondack Park, New York, USA (42o52' N, 71o58' W). The mercury, organic carbon, and sulfur stocks were significantly greater in the forest floor of limed areas (24.5 vs. 11.1 Hg g/ha for Oe and 31.6 vs. …