Engineering Commons^™

Production Of Synthetic Spider Silk Fibers, Cameron G. Copeland

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Dragline spider silk is among the strongest known biomaterials. It is the silk used for the framework of the web and it is used to catch the spider if it falls. As such, it is stronger and much more flexible than KEVLAR©. Studies show that dragline silk is made of two proteins, Major Ampullate Spider Proteins 1 and 2 (MaSp1 and MaSp2). Due to its incredible mechanical properties, spider silk is being considered for use as a new biomaterial for drug delivery and tendon and ligament replacement/repair, as well as athletic gear, military applications, airbags, and tire cords. However, spiders …

Effects On A Wedge Flowmeter Installed Downstream Of A Double Elbow Out Of Plane, Devan S. Radle

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Precise flow measurement is a critical part of many industries including industrial, hydropower, petroleum, nuclear, and water/wastewater. Lengthy upstream piping is required for many flowmeters to obtain accurate results. Due to piping constraints, sub- optimal flow meter installations can occur. One of these conditions is the installment of a flow meter in close proximity downstream of a double elbow out of plane (DEOP). A DEOP can cause swirl to form in the flow and can cause inaccurate metering results due to the non-uniform flow and pressure conditions. This study investigated the effect of installing a differential pressure producing wedge flow …

Developing More Efficient Mechanically Stabilized Earth (Mse) Wall Reinforcements, Matthew J. Rahmeyer

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The most common shape for metallic reinforcement in Mechanically Stabilized Earth (MSE) walls is a rectangular strip. The amount of force required to pull the reinforcement out of the wall versus how much steel is required is well balanced.

This study shows that a metal round bar can be altered, either by bending into various geometries or welding into crossbars, and provide similar and sometimes higher resistance to pullout than the rectangular strip. This was achieved while reducing the weight per foot of reinforcement of steel required and providing cost saving benefits.

The Influence Of Sediment Characteristics On The Fate Of Steroidogenic Compounds In Aquatic Systems And The Effects On Progesterone Bioavailability In A Target Organism, Jodi L. Sangster

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

There is growing concern about the biologic effects stemming from steroids in impacted waterways. In aquatic systems, interaction between steroids and sediment influence both contaminant fate as well as subsequent bioavailability to aquatic organisms. The focus of this dissertation research was to gain a better understanding of steroid behavior in aquatic systems based on the physiochemical properties of sediment and to use this knowledge to better understand the biological effects stemming from sediment-associated progesterone exposure. Two natural aquatic sediments, a sand and a silty loam, were selected to represent marked differences in sediments properties. Initially, sorption of 17β-estradiol, estrone, progesterone, …

Microbial Degradation Of Sulfonamide Antibiotics, Rachel Levine

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Certain microbes can transform antibiotics in the environment. However, little is known about the identity of these microbes and their antibiotic biotransformation processes. The objectives of this study were to (1) isolate bacterial strains capable of transforming antibiotics, (2) determine the biotransformation kinetics of antibiotics, (3) characterize the effects of background carbons on the biotransformation kinetics, and (4) identify biotransformation products under various environmental conditions. Sulfadiazine (SDZ) was used as the model antibiotic in this study due to its frequent occurrence in livestock wastes. Surface soil from a cattle feedlot was collected to enrich potential SDZ degrading bacteria. A mixed …

Volume-Change Restraining Effects In Continuous Precast/Prestressed Bridge Girders, Athul Alex

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

A variety of design and construction practices are feasible when building precast concrete continuous bridges with long spans. Precast, prestressed concrete continuous bridges have been implemented by countries around the world. Although these bridges have been in service for many years, there has been limited verification of the ability of connection to provide the predicted continuity. Subsequently many states in the United States design the girders as simple spans for both dead and live loads without considering any moments developed by the connection. The effect of thermal expansion and contraction is hardly considered in the analysis, even though it is …

Performance Assessment Of Deteriorated And Retrofitted Steel Hp Piles, Steven T. Stauffer

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Deterioration of aging bridges can be attributed to an assortment of mechanisms throughout the structure, with remediation policies also varying. This study focused on assessing the validity of the Nebraska Department of Roads’ (NDOR) reinforced concrete encasement retrofit for corroded steel HP piles. Experiments were designed and conducted to test the capacity of the NDOR retrofit and evaluate failure limit states. Two pile locations were considered: abutment and pile bent. For each location there was a non-deteriorated, deteriorated, and retrofitted case. These cases represented the pile at key stages during its life. NDOR’s concrete encasement retrofit provided the required stability …

Diffusion Modeling And Device Development For Peritoneal Membrane Oxygenation, Liana Hatoum

Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) is a pulmonary disease that causes hypoxemia and respiratory failure. The mortality rate for ARDS ranges between 27% and 45%. Current treatments including mechanical ventilation and extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) are often associated with high risk complications including barotrauma, infection, thrombosis, and hemorrhage. Alternative pulmonary support techniques are needed to improve the survival rate of patients suffering from ARDS. Previous studies introducing pure O₂ gas, perfluorocarbons and red blood cells into the intraperitoneal (IP) cavity have reported no effect or only a mild increase in oxygenation. Here we report peritoneal membrane oxygenation (PMO) using …

Mild Traumatic Brain Injury: Combined In Silico And In Vitro Studies, Yi Hua

Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Mild traumatic brain injury (TBI) is a significant public health concern worldwide and has attracted significant attention due to high-impact sport as well as improvised explosive devices used in military conflicts. The earliest sign of mild TBI is associated with cognitive, behavioral and physical/somatic changes, which are commonly invisible to existing medical techniques. Thus it is essential to target mechanisms of mild TBI and its associated damage measures for earlier diagnosis/treatment and enhanced protection strategies.

In this work, the mechanism of blast-induced mild TBI was inspected through integrated in silico and in vitro models. A three-dimensional (3D) human head model …

Lateral Resistance Of H-Piles And Square Piles Behind An Mse Wall With Ribbed Strip And Welded Wire Reinforcements, Andrew I. Luna

Theses and Dissertations

Bridges often use pile foundations behind MSE walls to help resist lateral loading from seismic and thermal expansion and contraction loads. Overdesign of pile spacing and sizes occur owing to a lack of design code guidance for piles behind an MSE wall. However, space constraints necessitate the installation of piles near the wall. Full scale lateral load tests were conducted on piles behind an MSE wall. This study involves the testing of four HP12X74 H-piles and four HSS12X12X5/16 square piles. The H-piles were tested with ribbed strip soil reinforcement at a wall height of 15 feet, and the square piles …

Low Cost, Carbon-Based Micro- And Nano-Structured Electrodes For High Performance Supercapacitors, Kryssia Pamela Díaz Orellana

All Dissertations

Advances in the development of sustainable, low-cost, and reliable energy storage technologies have become a high priority as the demand for high power, and high energy storage devices has risen with emerging technologies in electronics, transportation, and renewable energy systems. Supercapacitors, due to their relatively high energy density and power density, provide an attractive alternative to bridge the gap between conventional batteries and capacitors. Materials ranging from high surface area, inert carbons to Faradaic metal oxides and conducting polymers have been used to achieve a range of performance properties in supercapacitors. However, the development of new technologies faces many challenges, …

Investigation Of 186Re Via Radiative Thermal-Neutron Capture On 185Re, David A. Matters, Andrew G. Lerch, A. M. Hurst, L. Szentmiklosi, J. J. Carroll, B. Detwiler, Zs. Revay, John W. Mcclory, Stephen R. Mchale, R. B. Firestone, B. W. Sleaford, M. Krticka, T. Belgya

Faculty Publications

Partial ��-ray production cross sections and the total radiative thermal-neutron capture cross section for the ¹⁸⁵Re(n,��)¹⁸⁶Re reaction were measured using the Prompt Gamma Activation Analysis facility at the Budapest Research Reactor with an enriched ¹⁸⁵Re target. The ¹⁸⁶Re cross sections were standardized using well-known ³⁵Cl(n,��)³⁶Cl cross sections from irradiation of a stoichiometric ^natReCl₃ target. The resulting cross sections for transitions feeding the ¹⁸⁶Re ground state from low-lying levels below a cutoff energy of E_c=746keV were combined with a modeled probability of ground-state feeding from levels above E …

Conceptual Design Of Sleeve Rotor Synchronous Reluctance Motor For Traction Applications, Patel B. Reddy, Kevin Grace, Ayman M. El-Refaie

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Synchronous reluctance machines are very appealing for high speed traction motor design due to their robustness, simple structure, absence of magnets, and simple control. The absence of magnets means that synchronous reluctance (SynRel) machines are not susceptible to price variability and sustainability of rare-earth materials. Moreover, there are no concerns about demagnetisation or uncontrolled generation mode. However, the challenge of achieving a good constant power to speed ratio is dependent on the mechanical aspects of the design. Conventional SynRel designs perform poorly compared with the permanent magnet machines due to the presence of bridges and/or centre posts in absence of …

Advanced Gis: Smart Transportation, Christopher Bone, Ken Kato, Jacob Bartruff, Marc Schlossberg

TREC Final Reports

As sensors have become cheaper and more common, they have found an increasingly important role in transportation. However, curriculum to prepare students who will be working with these technologies as developers and planners has not developed at the same rate. The goal of this project was to develop a college course focused around sensors and smart transportation to be offered to undergrad and graduate students at the University of Oregon. The class focused on the practical application and the theoretical consequences of these developments. The class was offered in the spring term of 2015 to a group of undergraduate and …

Multimodal Transportation Planning Curriculum For Urban Planning Programs, Kristine M. Williams, Tia Claridge, Alexandria Carroll

TREC Final Reports

Integrated multimodal transportation and land use planning is critical to advancing mode choice, public health and safety, and livability objectives. Communities across the U.S. are seeking to redefine their planning process accordingly. In response, university graduate urban planning and engineering programs are beginning to address multimodal planning and sustainable transportation, but most do not yet offer a robust curriculum on these topics. To help address this need, the University of South Florida (USF), Center for Urban Transportation Research (CUTR) developed a curriculum for a course on multimodal transportation planning and its role in advancing livability and related objectives. The course …

Lesion Identification And The Effect Of Lesion On Motor Mapping After Stroke, Ruixi Zhou

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

Stroke is the most common cause of long-term severe disability and the motor system that is most commonly affected in stroke. One of the mechanisms that underlies recovery of motor deficits is reorganization or remapping of functional representations around the motor cortex. This mechanism has been shown in monkeys, but results in human subjects have been variable. In this thesis, I used a database that includes longitudinal behavioral and multimodal imaging data in both stroke patients and healthy controls for two research projects. Firstly, I improved an automatic lesion segmentation method to aid in the identification of the location and …

Assessment Of An Industrial Type Radiant Heating System For Drying Rough Rice, Anne Adhiambo Okeyo

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Rough rice is normally harvested at moisture contents (MCs) higher than that for safe storage. The objective for this study was to investigate the effectiveness of scaled-up infrared (IR) heating followed by tempering steps to dry freshly-harvested rough rice. An industrial type, pilot scale, IR drying equipment, designed to convey rough rice on a vibrating conveyor belt was used in this study. The heating zone of the equipment had catalytic IR emitters powered by natural gas. Freshly-harvested rough rice of long-grain pureline (cv. Cheniere), long-grain hybrid (cv. 6XP 756) and medium-grain (cv. CL 271) cultivars at initial moisture contents (IMCs) …

An Automatic Algorithm For Textured Digital Elevation Model Formation Using Aerial Texel Swaths, Taylor C. Bybee

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The process of creating a 3D terrain map of an area is a challenging, computationally intensive task. There are two main camps of established methods doing this, with varying degrees of accuracy and cost. Using the established methods, there is a trade-off between accuracy and cost. The first method involves using many aerial images to detect disparity between points in the images. This is a difficult task as it requires a lot of computer processing with varying degrees of reliability. In addition, this method does not make any direct distance measurements. Secondly, using high-precision and high-cost lasers and positioning equipment, …

Achieving Uniform Flow Distribution In Compact Irrigation Splitter Boxes With High Flow Rates, Joshua Ryan Hogge

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

In many irrigation systems and networks, there are multiple water users and shareholders who take their water from different locations along a single canal or pipeline. Often, irrigation splitter boxes are used to divert water to multiple shareholders from a single location. The splitter boxes, which can be small and compact, are generally installed at different locations along a piped irrigation supply line. The purpose of a splitter box is to split a specific amount of water so that each user receives their allotted portion, regardless of the flow rate in the system.

Each splitter box usually includes two compartments, …

Visualization Of Three-Dimensional Models From Multiple Texel Images Created From Fused Ladar/Digital Imagery, Cody C. Killpack

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The ability to create three-dimensional (3D) images offers a wide variety of solutions to meet ever increasing consumer demands. As popularity for 3D cinema and television continues to grow, 3D images will remain an important area of research and development. While there are a variety of ways to create a 3D model, textel images are quickly become the preferred solution that has been captured with a texel camera. The combination of multiple texel images taken around a scene can be used to form a texel model. Offering both visual and dimensional accuracy, texel models are becoming invaluable tools for disaster …

An Optical System To Transform The Output Beam Of A Quantum Cascade Laser To Be Uniform, Jordan M. Jacobson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Quantum cascade lasers (QCLs) are a candidate for calibration sources in space-based remote sensing applications. However, the output beam from a QCL has some characteristics that are undesirable in a calibration source. These characteristics need to be mitigated before QCLs can be used as calibration sources. This study presents the design and implementation of an optical system that removes the undesirable characteristics from a QCL output beam, so it can be used as a calibration source.

Efficient Device To Device Communications Underlaying Heterogeneous Networks, Xue Chen

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Device-to-Device communications have the great potential to bring significant performance boost to the conventional heterogeneous network by reusing cellular resources. In cellular networks, Device-to-Device communication is defined as two user equipments in a close range communicating directly with each other without going through the base station, thus offloading cellular traffic from cellular networks. In addition to improve network spectral efficiency, D2D communication can also improve energy efficiency and user experience.

However, the co-existence of D2D communication on the same spectrum with cellular users can cause severe interference to the primary cellular users. Thus the performance of cellular users must be …

Accumulation And Release Of Trace Inorganic Contaminants From Biofilm Matrices Produced And Challenged Under Drinking Water Distribution System Conditions, William W. Kent

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Drinking water distribution systems (DWDS) are used to transport drinking water from the place of treatment to your home. DWDS are made of many types of pipe materials and have the potential to accumulate materials such as iron and manganese oxides and biofilms that serve as reservoirs for toxic trace inorganic contaminants (TICs) such as thallium, arsenic, and lead. These materials can be stable, but changes in water quality or a physical disturbance such as road construction or water use changes may result in a TIC release, causing water quality degradation. This study used glass columns filled with glass beads …

Engineering Of Polyketide Biosynthetic Pathways For Bioactive Molecules, Siyuan Wang

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This study is focused on engineering of natural product biosynthetic pathways for efficient production of pharmaceutically important molecules or generation of new bioactive molecules for drug development.

Plant natural products are an important source of therapeutics, such as paclitaxel (anticancer) and artemisinin (anti-malarial). Production of plant natural products relies on conventional plant cultivation and solvent extraction, which is time-consuming and cost-ineffective. This work built a biosynthetic platform in Escherichia coli using seven biosynthetic genes from plants and bacteria, which were used to make valuable compounds such as the strong antioxidant resveratrol and anti-inflammatory agent curcuminoids. Through different combinations of these …

Blind Front-End Processing Of Dynamic Multi-Channel Wideband Signals, Kevin Jackson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Society today relies heavily on the exchange of information via wireless communication. Such communication provides the means of transferring information from point A to point B over the air. In order to accomplish this, a minimum of two devices is required: a transmitter and a receiver. Just as people must speak the same language in order to communicate, the receiver must know how the transmitter communicates in order to make sense of the data being transmitted. For multiple wireless communication system to coexist, they must each speak a unique language, which in the communications world is referred to as modulation. …

Thermal Property Measurement Of Thin Fibers By Complementary Methods, Troy Robert Munro

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Thin fibers are prevalent in many engineering materials. Measuring how well heat transfers in such small fibers can be difficult to determine, and previous methods have led to erroneous results. This dissertation details three proposed methods to improve the measurement of the thermal conductivity, thermal diffusivity, and volumetric heat capacity of thin fibers. Of particular interest is natural and synthetic spider silks because previously published values of the natural silk thermal conductivity was similar to copper, an excellent thermal conductor.

The three methods developed are the improved transient electrothermal technique (which was redeveloped to include radiation and convection heat losses …

Development Of A Three-Dimensional High-Order Strand-Grids Approach, Oisin Tong

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The strand-Cartesian grid approach is a unique method of generating and computing fluid dynamic simulations. The strand-Cartesian approach provides highly desirable qualities of fully-automatic grid generation and high accuracy. This work focuses on development of a high-accuracy methodology (high-order scheme) on strand grids for two and three dimensions.

In this work, the high-order scheme is extended to high-Reynolds number computations in both two and three dimensions with the Spalart-Allmaras turbulence model and the Menter SST turbulence model. In addition, a simple limiter is explored to allow the high-order scheme to accurately predict discontinuous flows.

Extensive verification and validation is conducted …

Anaerobic Hydrogen And Methane Production From Dairy Processing Waste: Experiment And Modeling, Jianming Zhong

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Dairy processing waste (DPW) is the waste produced from manufacturing dairy products: cheese, yogurt, ice cream, milk, butter, etc. DPW is high in chemical oxygen demand (COD) due to its lactose, fat and protein content, and therefore needs to be appropriately treated. An investigation was conducted to produce energy (hydrogen and methane) from DPW by anaerobic digestion. This project developed an effective engineering method for stable methane production from DPW without adding pH control chemicals. This study also explored the optimal operational condition for hydrogen production from DPW. We further built a mathematical model to help us monitor and predict …

Investigation Of The Tailoring Steps In Pradimicin Biosynthesis, Kandy L. Napan

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This research focused on the investigation of the late steps in the biosynthetic pathway of the novel antifungal and antiviral pradimicins A-C. Pradimicins were first isolated from the soil bacterium Actinomadura hibisca. These bioactive molecules are assembled by a type II polyketide biosynthetic pathway. Although the biosynthetic gene cluster of pradimicin has been identified, the functions of the biosynthetic genes and how they work collaboratively to form the final structures of pradimicins remain unknown. This research aims to functionally characterize the enzymes involved in the late steps of the biosynthetic route.

The early biosynthetic steps of pradimicins have been …

Quantifying The Removal Of Trichloroethylene Via Phytoremediation At Hill Air Force Base, Utah Operational Unit 2 Using Recent And Historical Data, J. Oliver Diamond

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Trichloroethylene (TCE) is a carcinogenic, chlorinated volatile organic compound that was commonly used as a degreasing solvent for aircraft maintenance at many US Air Force bases. Past improper disposal of TCE has resulted in contaminated groundwater plumes surrounding many of these facilities. Phytoremediation, defined as the use of plants and their associated microorganisms to stabilize or remove contamination, has been implemented as part of a TCE groundwater cleanup effort at Travis Air Force base near Sacramento, CA and is being considered as a remediation option at other bases. Volatilization of TCE from leaves and the surface of the soil near …