Engineering Commons^™

Multispecies Granular Biofilm Modelling For Simultaneous Anammox And Denitrification Processes In Batch Systems, Mohammad Azari, Manfred Lȕbken, Martin Denecke

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The nitrogen removal pathways in anaerobic ammonium oxidation (anammox) process where anaerobic ammonium-oxidizing bacteria and denitrifying heterotrophs convert ammonium and nitrite directly to dinitrogen gas under anoxic conditions were investigated using a mathematical model. The Activated Sludge Model No. 1 (ASM1) was modified with two step denitrification and one-step anaerobic ammonia oxidation. A one dimensional granular biofilm model was implemented in Aquasim 2.1v (EAWAG, Switzerland) in order to describe a series of batch processes operated in a bioreactor treating synthetic wastewater. A sophisticated statistical method was used for parameter estimation. The model was not sensitive with respect to the detachment …

Optimal Scales Of Neighbourhood Effects On Land- Use Change: An Analysis Procedure Applied In An Alpine Mountainous Region, Quang Bao Le, Robert Huber

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Neighbourhood effects on land use change are very common. Therefore, they are often included in spatially explicit models of land use change and other spatial analyses. Neighbourhood indices, however, depend strongly on the spatial extent set for calculating them. So far, most of the existing land-use change analyses or models using neighbourhood indices assumed some predefined neighbourhood extents without proving whether the selected extents are optimal for the analysis of the corresponding land use dynamics. This paper presents a methodological procedure to identify (i) the optimal neighbourhood extent and (ii) the range of scale-dependency in neighbourhood effects of different land …

Interoperability Between The Basic Modeling Interface (Bmi) And The Open Modeling Interface (Openmi): A Step Toward Building The Earth System Bridge For Modeling Framework Interoperability, Jonathan L. Goodall, Scott D. Peckham

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Interoperability among environmental modeling frameworks is important to allow for the exchange of software components for modeling, analysis, and data access between these systems. Modeling frameworks share the concept of encapsulating models as software components or services within a larger modeling framework where the components have defined interfaces and data exchange formats. However, the exact definition of these interfaces and data exchange formats differs across modeling frameworks. The Earth System Bridge project, funded by the US National Science Foundation (NSF) under their EarthCube program, seeks to address this challenge by adopting a core model component that can be wrapped using …

Using System-Dynamics For Advanced Decision Making And Sustainable Water-Use For Farm Irrigation, Monika Von Haaren, Sylvia Herrmann

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Under the conditions of climate change, an efficient use of water is crucial for sustainable resource management. There is a need of user-friendly systems to evaluate the complex system of water use in agriculture. In this scientific research, the factors that have a significant effect on irrigation and the assessment of water consumption were determined by a system-dynamics approach. The developed model includes selected components of irrigation farming and shows interactions of these elements. The model was defined based on expert inputs and a participatory stakeholder process to analyse the interactions within the system "water extraction for irrigation" and derive …

Evidence Of Contaminant Storage At The Soil/Vadose Zone Interface And Implication For Nitrate Residence Time Modeling In Groundwaters, E. Viel, M. Dedewanou, Yves Coquet, S. Binet

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The “Beauce” limestone aquifer is contaminated by nitrate and pesticides mostly coming from agricultural activities. In this region the vadose zone can extend to more than 20 m in depth, appears to be highly heterogeneous and plays a significant role in the retention and/or release of pollutants to aquifers and wells. In order to gain insight into contaminant transfer in the vadose zone, tracer experiments were conducted in a pit, 4 meters wide, 1.6 meters deep, using (1) 30 L of brilliant blue (BB) at a concentration of 6 g/L to map the preferential flow along the percolation profile and …

Socio Environmental Conflicts In Ecuador. The Use Of Preprocessing And Data Mining To Detect Influencing Factors On Violence And Crisis (1985 - 2016), Lina Pita Merino, Martí Rosas-Casals, Karina Gibert

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The main concern regarding the spread of Socio Environmental Conflicts (SEC) is the constant increase of extractive activities to support the economic system. Conflicts originated in the clash of interests between the extractive industries and local populations is the more visible outcome, but the complexity of this phenomenon may not be that obvious. Among South American countries, the highest murder rates of environmental activists corresponded to Brazil, Peru and Colombia, three of the four Amazonian countries along with Ecuador (Global Witness, 2015). In addition, all of them have similar characteristics such as high levels of inequality and the presence of …

Emergency Maps Tool – Facilitating Collaboration And Decision Making During Emergency & Crises Situations, Gerald Schimak, Peter Kutschera, Refiz Duro, Katharina Kutschera

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The Emergency Maps Tool (EMT) has been developed as part of a collaboration environment in the C2-SENSE Emergency Interoperability Framework (www.c2-sense.eu). The collaboration environment aims to connect all relevant organizations for joint response in emergency and crises situations. The Emergency Maps Tool aims to display all relevant resources (e.g., authorities, organization, points and object of interests, messages, etc.) involved or of special importance, in order to allow proper decision making. EMT allows decision makers to set and monitor activities, send and receive event related messages but also to include ad-hoc information from sensors or sensor networks (e.g., water monitoring sensors …

Bluetooth Beacon Network Suitability For Crisis Management, Jonas Sevcik

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

This research addresses assessment of Bluetooth Low Energy beacon based sensor networks used indoors for navigation or localization purposes, e.g. for fire brigade or during emergency evacuation. The objective of this research is to evaluate suitability of beacon technology in the terms of overall stability and precision. We focused on commercially highly deployed beacon brand Estimote, for usage in such network infrastructures. These beacons were tested in a real field deployment conditions, with focus on radiated signal quality and its spreading. Test measurements were made by iOS based smartphones to evaluate precision of user localization. Furthermore, beacons were tested in …

Development Of A Novel Mobile Industrial-Scale Fluidized Adsorption Process For Emergency Treatment Of Water Polluted By Aniline: Cfd Simulation And Experiments, Zhaolin Du, Tong Zheng, Huizhe Cao, Jiping Jiang, Peng Wang

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Sudden river chemical spills accidents occurred frequently these years and caused great economic losses and odious social impacts. Although the current methods, such as the granular activated carbon package treatment in the Sudden Water Pollution Accident of Zhuozhang River of China, could make the water quality up to the standard, they resulted in the limited flow ability and low mass transfer capability, and also had some difficulty treating the unpredicted emergencies because of its location-specific treatment and time-consuming preparation work. Hence, a novel mobile industrial-scale fluidized adsorption process, which could address the above problems and was fast to deploy with …

Participatory Modelling To Assess Climate Impacts On Water Resources In The Big Wood Basin, Idaho, J. Koch, A. Inouye, D. Lach, J. Stevenson, J. P. Bolte

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Many of the natural resource issues we face today cannot be fully understood using normal scientific methods or theories. When uncertainties or decision stakes are high, participation by an “extended peer community” can be critical to studying and managing complex systems since local expertise on land use and ecosystem processes may not otherwise be captured. We conducted a case study of participatory modelling to support natural resource management under a changing climate. Over a two-year period, we convened a Knowledge to Action Network (KTAN) of scientists and stakeholders interested in exploring the impacts of climate change in Idaho’s Big Wood …

R Package Mvghd: Causal Inference Procedure For Geographic High-Dimensional, Stéphane Bourrelly, Pascal Auquier

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Causal statistic inference is a key issue in machine learning. The goal is designing procedures that are able to select relevant subsets of explanatory variables, which might help scientists to better understand the underlying mechanisms behind the studied phenomena. We present a causal statistic inference procedure, especially designed for Geographic High-dimensional Datasets (GHD). The promise of discovering unknown informative factors are as great as the intrinsic learning challenges in these complex datasets, which are more and more common in the fields of environment, health, ecology, epidemiology, geography, agriculture, etc. Firstly, we point out the difference between the variable selection strategies …

From Openmi To Hydrocouple: Advancing Openmi To Support Experimental Simulations And Standard Geospatial Datasets, Caleb A. Buahin, Jeffery S. Horsburgh

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

HydroCouple is a cross-platform, component-based modeling interface definition that largely follows the Open Modeling Interface 2.0 (OpenMI) specification. HydroCouple provides advancements to better facilitate those experimental model investigations that fall into the so-called “embarrassingly parallel” class of simulations, including uncertainty assessment, ensemble forecasting, and optimization simulations. Additionally, HydroCouple explicitly incorporates low level interface definitions for multi- dimensional datasets and geospatial data formats including the Open Geospatial Consortium’s Simple Feature Access specification, raster datasets, and meshes that are widely used in the earth systems and environmental modeling field. In this paper, we describe these and other advances provided by the HydroCouple …

Towards A Neural Networks-Based Prediction Tool Devoted To Low Water-Levels Forecasting: Relevant Architecture Selection Based On Main Physical Processes, A. Coutouis, A. Johannet, S. Pistre, P. -A. Ayral, L. Cadilhac

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Karst aquifers provide water resource for a large part of the Mediterranean population and water resource becomes a strategic problem during summer when population increases due to tourism. To help managers to optimize the exploitation of water, this work studies the ability of a neural network model to efficiently simulate water levels in the Cèze River, connected to a karst aquifer, few months ahead during the dry season. The neural model is based on recurrent multilayer perceptrons that learn the relations between inputs (mainly rainfall and ETP) and output (water level). After a training step using 17 years of data, …

Paper And Pebbles Simulations And Modelling For The Governance Of Socio-Environmental Systems: A Review Of 8 Years Of Experimenting With The Wat-Agame Toolkit, Géraldine Abrami, Nils Ferrand, Raphaele Ducrot, Sylvie Morardet, Emeline Hassenforder, Patrice Garin, Bruno Bonté, Patrice Robin, Wanda Aquae-Gaudi

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Wat-A-Game (WAG) is an open toolkit and a method based on simple bricks for designing and using participatory simulations (i.e. role playing games) for water management, policy design and education. It is included in a more extensive package of integrated methods and tools, called CoOPLAaGE, targeting the main needs and steps in the multilevel decision and management process.

The main principle of WAG is to use pebbles to show explicitly how water (and other resources) flows, and are transformed and used, and different paper elements and cards to represent space, activities and rules (Abrami et al, 2012; Ferrand et al, …

Experimental Data Extraction And In Silico Prediction Of The Estrogenic Activity Of Renewable Replacements For Bisphenol A., Huixiao Hong, Benjamin G Harvey, Giuseppe R Palmese, Joseph F. Stanzione Iii, Hui Wen Ng, Sugunadevi Sakkiah, Weida Tong, Joshua M Sadler

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

Bisphenol A (BPA) is a ubiquitous compound used in polymer manufacturing for a wide array of applications; however, increasing evidence has shown that BPA causes significant endocrine disruption and this has raised public concerns over safety and exposure limits. The use of renewable materials as polymer feedstocks provides an opportunity to develop replacement compounds for BPA that are sustainable and exhibit unique properties due to their diverse structures. As new bio-based materials are developed and tested, it is important to consider the impacts of both monomers and polymers on human health. Molecular docking simulations using the Estrogenic Activity Database in …

Student Spotlight | Biological Engineering, Usu College Of Engineering

College of Engineering News

July 2016 - Q&A with Biological Engineering student Harsh Singh

Optimal Grasp Synthesis To Apply Normal And Shear Stresses Of Failure In Beams, Mehrdad Kermani Ph.D., P.Eng., Mahyar Abdeetedal

Electrical and Computer Engineering Publications

This paper investigates the less-studied problem of failing/yielding an object purposefully by a robotic hand. A grasp synthesis capable of using the whole limb surface of the robotic hand is designed based on internal force decomposition. The introduced approach is based on quasistatic assumption and optimization of active internal forces in order to counterbalance the formulated task wrench/load of yielding. As different geometrical constraints are dictated by the manipulation circumstances (e.g. metallic sheet shaping or robotic harvesting), the yielding wrench optimization is developed to be not only sufficient for yielding the object but also effective in meeting all motion restrictions …

Linear Precoding For Cognitive Multiple Access Wiretap Channel With Finite-Alphabet Inputs, Juening Jin, Chengshan Xiao, Meixia Tao, Wen Chen

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This paper investigates the linear precoder design for cognitive multiple-access wiretap channel (CMAC-WT), where two secondary-user transmitters (STs) communicate with one secondary-user receiver (SR) in the presence of an eavesdropper and subject to interference threshold constraints at primary-user receivers (PRs). It designs linear precoders to maximize the ergodic secrecy sum rate for multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) CMAC-WT under finite-alphabet inputs and statistical channel state information (CSI). For this non-convex problem, a two-layer algorithm is proposed by embedding the convex-concave procedure into an outer approximation framework. The key idea of this algorithm is to reformulate the approximated ergodic secrecy sum rate as …

Standardization Of Human-Computer-Interface For Geo-Fencing In Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems, David Thirtyacre, Robert Brents, Michael Goldfein, David Hunter, B. Terwilliger

Publications

The use of small unmanned aircraft systems (sUAS) has increased significantly in the past year. Geographic fencing (geo-fencing) is software built into most medium-cost consumer sUAS. This software is typically used to limit the altitude above launch point, the flight distance from the transmitting controller, and/or restrict flight inside a no-fly zone. While the concept of a geo-fence is simplistic, the human-computer-interface (HCI) varies drastically among platforms, and even between software iterations on the same platform. This research examines the HCI of three popular consumer-level sUAS with regard to geo-fencing. The software procedures and human interface for the DJI Inspire-1, …

The Design, Implementation, Evaluation And Results Of A Race Car For The Collegiate Formula Sae Electric Competition, Quinn Jasha Bryan Sullivan

Dissertations and Theses

The Formula SAE Electric competition is a collegiate autocross event in which teams design, build, and race an open-wheeled electric race car. The main motivation is the efficiency advantage of electric motors over internal combustion motors. This thesis presents the design and evaluation of two generations of Portland State University electric race cars.

The constraints are the competition rules, finances, human resources, and time required to complete a race car in one year. The design includes the implementation of existing components: battery cells, controllers, electric motors, drivetrains, and tire data for an optimized race car. Also, several circuits were designed …

Government Motivation-Embedded Return Guarantee For Urban Infrastructure Projects Based On Real Options, Qingpeng Man, Chengshuang Sun, Yuesheng Fei, Martin Skitmore, Yong Bai, Weizhuo Lu

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Governments usually guarantee the amount of investment income to private sector partners to encourage their participation in Public-Private Partnership urban infrastructure development projects, with the ‘float return on investment guarantee’ being the main method in use by the Chinese government today. The current problems with the float return on investment guarantee are analysed and a guarantee approach with embedded motivational behaviour is presented as an alternative. A pricing method option is then introduced as the motivation-embedded return guarantee has similar characteristics to real options. From this, a valuation model is developed that provides the basis of a new systematic method …

Methods For Culturing Retinal Pigment Epithelial Cells: A Review Of Current Protocols And Future Recommendations, Aaron H. Fronk, Elizabeth Vargis

Biological Engineering Faculty Publications

The retinal pigment epithelium is an important part of the vertebrate eye, particularly in studying the causes and possible treatment of age-related macular degeneration. The retinal pigment epithelium is difficult to access in vivo due to its location at the back of the eye, making experimentation with age-related macular degeneration treatments problematic. An alternative to in vivo experimentation is cultivating the retinal pigment epithelium in vitro, a practice that has been going on since the 1970s, providing a wide range of retinal pigment epithelial culture protocols, each producing cells and tissue of varying degrees of similarity to natural retinal pigment …

Insights Into Twinning In Mg Az31: A Combined Ebsd And Machine Learning Study, David T. Fullwood, Andrew Orme, Isaac Chelladurai, Travis Michael Rampton, Ali Khosravani, Michael Miles, Raj K. Mishra

Faculty Publications

To explore the driving forces behind deformation twinning in Mg AZ31, a machine learning framework is utilized to mine data obtained from electron backscatter diffraction (EBSD) scans in order to extract correlations in physical characteristics that cause twinning. The results are intended to inform physics-based models of twin nucleation and growth. A decision tree learning environment is selected to capture the relationships between microstructure and twin formation; this type of model effectively highlights the more influential characteristics of the local microstructure. Trees are assembled to analyze both twin nucleation in a given grain, and twin propagation across grain boundaries. Each …

Analysing The Error Potential Of Administrative Data In Determining The Sinuosity Of Small Rivers, Pierre Karrasch, Sebastian Hunger

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

According to the European Water Framework Directive the member states are committed to prove the good ecological status of all water bodies. These requirements are verified by a regular monitoring. Especially the use of remote sensing data and methods of applied geoinformatics and statistics can be recommended for the monitoring of several hydromorphological parameters. At the same time for some single parameters basic geodata provided by local authorities are available (e.g. river centrelines). In this study the quality of these basic geodata is compared with self-extracted results using different remote sensing data sources (CIR-orthophoto, digital terrain model). The results reveal …

Artificial Intelligence Techniques To Enhance Actors’ Decision Strategies In Socio-­Ecological Agent-­ Based Models, Shaheen A. Abdulkareem, Ellen-­Wien Augustijn-­Beckers, Yaseen T. Mustafa, Tatiana Filatova

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Agent-­Based Models (ABMs) are indispensable to studying the aggregated impacts of individual actions of heterogeneous interacting adaptive agents. Concurrently, artificial intelligence has been employed for decades to simulate autonomous actions of individual entities that react, learn and exchange information with an environment and one another. There are obvious synergies between the two computational approaches. For example, artificial intelligence is often used to enhance agents’ behaviour in ABMs. Artificial intelligence learning algorithms (AILAs) allow for a richer agents’ architecture for operationalization of more realistic learning decisions beyond a simplistic treatment of agents’ cognitive and sensory capacities. Firstly, we review recent socio-­economic …

Experimental Measurement Of Stakeholder Expectation Formation And Risk Taking Behaviour For Integrated Regional Agricultural Land Use Modelling, Marius Eisele, Christian Troost, Thomas Berger

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

Understanding how stakeholders respond to climate signals, form expectations about the future and adapt behaviour under uncertainty is crucial for simulating land use change in integrated assessment models. Traditional economic models of expectation formation assume rational or quasi- rational patterns of expectation formation and have typically been derived in the context of price expectations. Approaches for modelling decisions under uncertainty typically either follow the paradigms of (subjective) expected utility maximization or prospect theory.

These approaches however may not fit to the analysis of climate change responses due to ambiguous climate signals, a long time span of change, and the significance …

Gis Mash-Ups In The Cloud: Visualizing Online Data Using Hydroshare And Tethys Platform, Daniel P. Ames, Shawn Crawley, Zhiyu Li

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

HydroShare is a web based data management system for climate and water data that is includes a web-services application programmer interface (API) to allow third party programmers to access and use its open data resources. To provide end users with data analysis and visualization tools for HydroShare resources, we have implemented an online web app development system called Tethys Platform and have developed several apps that utilize the HydroShare API. Tethys Platform is an open source software package based on the Django framework and Python programming language. The Tethys software development kit allows users to create web apps for visualizing, …

Effects Of Climate Data Aggregation On Regional Net Primary Production (Npp) Modelling, Matthias Kuhnert, Jagadeesh Yeluripati, Pete Smith, Holger Hoffmann, Marcel Van Oijen, Julie Constantin, Elsa Coucheney, Rene Dechow, Henrik Eckersten, Thomas Gaiser, Balász Grosz, Edwin Haas, Kurt-Christian Kersebaum, Ralf Kiese, Steffen Klatt, Elisabet Lewan, Claas Nendel, Helene Raynal, Carmen Sosa, Xenia Specka, Edmar Teixeira, Enli Wang, Lutz Weihermüller, Gang Zhao, Zhigan Zhao, Stephen Ogle, Frank Ewert

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

In ecosystem modelling studies, data are often collected at a small scale but are used in models to predict ecosystem responses e.g. net primary production (NPP) at coarser scale, using data aggregation. The data aggregation causes errors that are difficult to predict, because of model complexity and our limited knowledge of the spatial heterogeneity underlying our aggregated input values. Input aggregation thus adds to the uncertainty associated with model predictions. One way of reducing uncertainty related to input aggregation error is to evaluate models at different resolutions for areas where high-resolution input data are available. The objective of this study …

Climate Change Impacts And Implications: An Integrated Assessment In A Lowland Environment Of New Zealand, A. G.E. Ausseil, K. Bodmin, A. Daigneault, E. Teixeira, E. D. Keller, M. U. F. Kirschbaum, L. Timar, A. Dunningham, C. Zammit, S. Stephens, M. Cameron, P. Blackett, G. Harmsworth, B. Frame, A. Reisinger, A. Tait, D. Rutledge

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

New Zealand’s mixed economy includes a range of sectors (e.g. primary production, energy, tourism) that depend heavily on the state of natural resource capital. This makes the economy heavily dependent on future global climate change and the global economic situation. In this paper, we present a framework to evaluate socio-economic and environmental impacts of future climate and land-use change, and give results for one scenario in a typical lowland environment in New Zealand. The future scenario was designed as a combination of global climate and socio-economic assumptions, along with New Zealand-specific policy assumptions. We evaluated the impacts and implications of …

Water Resource Management With The Management Software Manuela, Monika Von Haaren

International Congress on Environmental Modelling and Software

The impact of climate change with increasing droughts will lead to an increase of water consumption in agriculture. Even in Germany, agricultural land is already irrigated intensively to secure harvests at a higher level. The demand for additional irrigation will lead to conflicts between agriculture, water management and nature conservation. This paper shows a new way for the evaluation of water use in agricultural farming. With the developed method stakeholder can assess the water consumption for irrigation in agriculture, which is transferable, regionally applicable and comparable. The water-module is available as a new plug-in in the management software MANUELA and …