Engineering Commons^™

Shkaqet E Aksidenteve Dhe Lëndimeve Në Sektorin E Ndërtimit Në Kosovë, Faton Lakna

Theses and Dissertations

Republika e Kosovës gjatë luftës pati një shkatërrim mjaft të madh, e në veçanti në sektorin e ndërtimtarisë dhe infrastrukturës. Që nga ajo kohë, kërkesa për ndërtimin e njësive banesore dhe infrastrukturës rrugore ishte në rritje. Zhvillimi i sektorit të ndërtimit përveç tjerash, ndikoj edhe në rritjen e numrit të punësuarve në këtë sektor. Për shkak të përvojës jo të mjaftueshme në këtë fushë, pati edhe shumë të lënduar dhe raste me fatalitet në vendin e punës. Me formimin e institucioneve të Kosovës, fillimisht atyre të përkohshme, u miratuan edhe shume ligje e rregullore rreth për sigurisë dhe mbrojtjes në …

Medium Duty Gas-Turbine Engine Blade Removal Tool, Elliott James Greb, Jacob Thomas Syage, Kellen Thomas Field

Mechanical Engineering

Solar Turbines Incorporated sponsored a team of three Cal Poly Undergraduate Mechanical Engineering students to design, manufacture, prototype, and test a tool for the removal of turbine blades from their respective disk assembly without damaging the disk itself. The tool was developed for Solar’s industrial gas turbine engines. The tool complies with all OSHA and Solar Turbines safety and engineering constraints, and was designed for use in a shop facility. The tool was made adaptable for geometric variances in multiple turbine rotor disk stages, and requires no more than one technician to operate using a maximum of two shop resources. …

Hollow-Core Frp-Concrete-Steel Bridge Columns Under Torsional Loading, Sujith Anumolu, Omar I. Abdelkarim, Mohanad M. Abdulazeez, Ahmed Gheni, Mohamed Elgawady

Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This paper presents the behavior of hollow-core fiber-reinforced polymer-concrete-steel (HC-FCS) columns under cyclic torsional loading combined with constant axial load. The HC-FCS consists of an outer fiber-reinforced polymer (FRP) tube and an inner steel tube, with a concrete shell sandwiched between the two tubes. The FRP tube was stopped at the surface of the footing, and provided confinement to the concrete shell from the outer direction. The steel tube was embedded into the footing to a length of 1.8 times the diameter of the steel tube. The longitudinal and transversal reinforcements of the column were provided by the steel tube …

Application Of P300 Event-Related Potential In Brain-Computer Interface, Ali Raider, Reza Fazel-Rezai

Electrical Engineering Faculty Publications

The primary purpose of this chapter is to demonstrate one of the applications of P300 event-related potential (ERP), i.e., brain-computer interface (BCI). Researchers and students will find the chapter appealing with a preliminary description of P300 ERP. This chapter also appreciates the importance and advantages of noninvasive ERP technique. In noninvasive BCI, the P300 ERPs are extracted from brain electrical activities [electroencephalogram (EEG)] as a signature of the underlying electrophysiological mechanism of brain responses to the external or internal changes and events. As the chapter proceeds, topics are covered on more relevant scholarly works about challenges and new directions in …

Calibrating And Evaluating Dynamic Rule-Based Transit-Signal-Priority Control Systems In Urban Traffic Networks, Md Didarul Alam

Civil and Environmental Engineering Dissertations

Setting the traffic controller parameters to perform effectively in real-time is a challenging task, and it entails setting several parameters to best suit some predicted traffic conditions. This study presents the framework and method that entail the application of the Response Surface Methodology (RSM) to calibrate the parameters of any control system incorporating advanced traffic management strategies (e.g., the complex integrated traffic control system developed by Ahmed and Hawas). The integrated system is a rule-based heuristic controller that reacts to specific triggering conditions, such as identification of priority transit vehicle, downstream signal congestion, and incidents by penalizing the predefined objective …

Experimental Study Of Low Salinity Water Flooding And Fracturing Effects In Low Permeability Carbonate Reservoir, Benny Arianto Harahap

Theses

In past decades, there were numerous research works demonstrated that salinity alteration of injected water could enhance the oil recovery. Low salinity water (LSW) injection is a type of Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) method, which attracts the industrial, and researchers because of its simplicity to use the implications,

Environment-friendly nature, and less cost. In addition to, hydraulic fracturing, also known as hydraulic stimulation, is another EOR method that improves hydrocarbon flow by creating fractures in the Low Permeability Formation (LPF) that connects the reservoir and wellbore. Fractures will increase the permeability of reservoir and give the flow path for hydrocarbon …

Learning Curve Analysis Using Intensive Longitudinal And Cluster-Correlated Data, Xiao Zhong, Zeyi Sun, Haoyi Xiong, Neil Heffernan, Md Monirul Islam

Engineering Management and Systems Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Intensive longitudinal and cluster-correlated data (ILCCD) can be generated in any situation where numerical or categorical characteristics of multiple individuals or study units are observed and measured at tens, hundreds, or thousands of occasions. The spacing of measurements in time for each individual can be regular or irregular, fixed or random, and the number of characteristics measured at each occasion may be few or many. Such data can also arise in situations involving continuous-time measurements of recurrent events. Generalized linear models (GLMs) are usually considered for the analysis of correlated non-normal data, while multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) is another …

Chaotic Behavior In High-Gain Interleaved Dc-Dc Converters, Ahmad Alzahrani, Pourya Shamsi, Mehdi Ferdowsi, Cihan H. Dagli

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

In this paper, chaotic behavior in high gain dc-dc converters with current mode control is explored. The dc-dc converters exhibit some chaotic behavior because they contain switches. Moreover, in power electronics (circuits with more passive elements), the dynamics become rich in nonlinearity and become difficult to capture with linear analytical models. Therefore, studying modeling approaches and analysis methods is required. Most of the high-gain dc-dc boost converters cannot be controlled with only voltage mode control due to the presence of right half plane zero that narrows down the stability region. Therefore, the need of current mode control is necessary to …

Modeling And Simulation Of Microgrid, Ahmad Alzahrani, Mehdi Ferdowsi, Pourya Shamsi, Cihan H. Dagli

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Complex computer systems and electric power grids share many properties of how they behave and how they are structured. A microgrid is a smaller electric grid that contains several homes, energy storage units, and distributed generators. The main idea behind microgrids is the ability to work even if the main grid is not supplying power. That is, the energy storage unit and distributed generation will supply power in that case, and if there is excess in power production from renewable energy sources, it will go to the energy storage unit. Therefore, the electric grid becomes decentralized in terms of control …

Solar Irradiance Forecasting Using Deep Neural Networks, Ahmad Alzahrani, Pourya Shamsi, Cihan H. Dagli, Mehdi Ferdowsi

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Predicting solar irradiance has been an important topic in renewable energy generation. Prediction improves the planning and operation of photovoltaic systems and yields many economic advantages for electric utilities. The irradiance can be predicted using statistical methods such as artificial neural networks (ANN), support vector machines (SVM), or autoregressive moving average (ARMA). However, they either lack accuracy because they cannot capture long-term dependency or cannot be used with big data because of the scalability. This paper presents a method to predict the solar irradiance using deep neural networks. Deep recurrent neural networks (DRNNs) add complexity to the model without specifying …

An Optical Interferometric Triaxial Displacement Sensor For Structural Health Monitoring: Characterization Of Sliding And Debonding For A Delamination Process, Chen Zhu, Yizheng Chen, Yiyang Zhuang, Yang Du, Rex E. Gerald Ii, Yan Tang, Jie Huang

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This paper presents an extrinsic Fabry-Perot interferometer-based optical fiber sensor (EFPI) for measuring three-dimensional (3D) displacements, including interfacial sliding and debonding during delamination. The idea employs three spatially arranged EFPIs as the sensing elements. In our sensor, the three EFPIs are formed by three endfaces of three optical fibers and their corresponding inclined mirrors. Two coincident roof-like metallic structures are used to support the three fibers and the three mirrors, respectively. Our sensor was calibrated and then used to monitor interfacial sliding and debonding between a long square brick of mortar and its support structure (i.e., a steel base plate) …

Secure Degrees Of Freedom For The Mimo Wire-Tap Channel With A Multi-Antenna Cooperative Jammer, Mohamed Nafea, Aylin Yener

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

In this paper, a multiple antenna wire-tap channel in the presence of a multi-antenna cooperative jammer is studied. In particular, the secure degrees of freedom (s.d.o.f.) of this channel is established, with $N-{t}$ antennas at the transmitter, $N-{r}$ antennas at the legitimate receiver, and $N-{e}$ antennas at the eavesdropper, for all possible values of the number of antennas, $N-{c}$, at the cooperative jammer. In establishing the result, several different ranges of $N-{c}$ need to be considered separately. The lower and upper bounds for these ranges of $N-{c}$ are derived and are shown to be tight. The achievability techniques developed rely …

On Linear Precoding Of Nonregenerative Mimo Relay Networks For Finite-Alphabet Source, Xiao Liang, Zhi Ding, Chengshan Xiao

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Multiple input and multiple output (MIMO) relay could provide broader wireless coverage, better diversity, and higher throughput. Most existing precoder designs for either source or relay node are based on the assumption of Gaussian input signals. However, recent works have revealed possible performance loss of MIMO systems originally optimized for Gaussian source signals when applied to practical finite-alphabet source signals. In this work, we investigate the design problem of joint MIMO precoding for wireless two-hop nonregenerative cooperative relay networks under finite-alphabet source signals. We identify several structural properties of optimal precoders. Specifically, we provided the optimal left singular vectors of …

Broadband Infrared Absorbers With Stacked Double Chromium Ring Resonators, H. Deng, L. Stan, D. Czaplewski, Jie Gao, Xiaodong Yang

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

No abstract provided.

In-Place Recycling And Reclamation Of Asphaltic Concrete Pavements In Kentucky, David Q. Hunsucker, David L. Allen, R. Clark Graves

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

Full-depth reclamation has been defined by the Asphalt Recycling and Reclaiming Association as a “rehabilitation technique in which the full thickness of the asphalt pavement and a predetermined portion of the underlying material (base, subbase, and/or subgrade) is uniformly pulverized, blended and compacted to provide an upgraded, homogeneous material resulting in a stabilized base course.” The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet has utilized the full-depth reclamation (FDR) process as a method to address asphalt pavements exhibiting widespread base failures. The FDR process transforms the existing hot mix asphalt (HMA) pavement and underlying granular materials into a stabilized base layer. The stabilized layer …

Curricula Of Atmae Accredited University Programs: Building A Composite, Mark Doggett

SEAS Faculty Publications

The 2017 ATMAE Accreditation Handbook Standard 5 states that each baccalaureate program/ option should meet minimum-maximum semester hour requirements in the foundational areas of general education, mathematics, physical (or life) sciences, management, technical, and electives. The specific credit hours required for each category has a specified range. This study attempted to answer the question of what courses typical ATMAE accredited university programs most frequently require. ATMAE accredits four-year manufacturing, industrial, construction, and information technology programs. To what extent are these accredited programs similar in content? Is there a representative convention of content for university courses?

The objectives of the research …

Hydrodynamic And Thermal Effects Of Sub-Critical Heating On Superhydrophobic Surfaces And Microchannels, Adam M. Cowley

Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation focuses on the effects of heating on superhydrophobic (SHPo) surfaces. The work is divided into two main categories: heat transfer without mass transfer and heat transfer in conjunction with mass transfer. Numerical methods are used to explore the prior while experimental methods are utilized for the latter. The numerical work explores convective heat transfer in SHPo parallel plate microchannels and is separated into two stand-alone chapters that have been published archivally. The first considers surfaces with a rib/cavity structure and the second considers surfaces patterned with a square lattice of square posts. Laminar, fully developed, steady flow with …

Weighting The Perceived Importance Of Minimising Economic, Social And Environmental/Cultural Risks In Flood Risk Management, Zeinab Bedri, John O'Sullivan, Mark Adamson

Conference papers

In 2006, the Office of Public Works (OPW) began the National Catchment-based Flood Risk Assessment and Management (CFRAM) Programme through a series of pilot studies. A Multi-Criteria Analysis (MCA) Framework was developed through the CFRAM pilot studies that integrated a range of objectives related to human health and society, the environment and cultural heritage and the economy into the core process of selecting suitable flood risk management measures for a given area or location, and then for prioritising national investments for different schemes and projects. In support of this MCA framework, UCD, was commissioned to undertake a collaborative study with …

Establishing The Key Pillars Of Innovation Required To Execute A Successful Bim Strategy Within A Construction Sme In Ireland, Barry Mcauley, Patrick Carroll

Conference papers

The recent resurgence of the Irish Construction Industry comes at a time of global transition towards an information revolution, with technology now playing a vital role within our post-recessionary society. BIM is now seen as a core technology at the forefront of this transformational change which can present Construction SMEs with opportunities to new financial ventures. If any SME organisation is to be successful with BIM adoption then innovation must be the starting point. The aim of this paper is to establish the enabling factors required for innovating a BIM strategy within a SME Construction Organisation. The methodology involved a …

A Comparative Investigation Of Industry, Academics' And Students' Perceptions On Essential Sustainability Knowledge, Competencies And Skills, Lloyd Scott

Conference papers

Design and construction educational programmes offered throughout the world play a vital role in sustainability education by producing professionals knowledgeable and competent in sustainable practices. It is extremely important to align the sustainability knowledge of the graduates to the industry expectations. This paper compares industry expectations about essential sustainability knowledge with both academics and students perceptions of requisite knowledge about sustainability. A three stage mixed research approach was adopted for the study. Essential sustainability knowledge expected from recent graduates was identified through literature review and surveys of architectural design and construction firms. Students enrolled in architecture and construction programmes were …

Accelerated Innovation Deployment (Aid) Demonstration: Kytc — Roundabout Installation Project In London, Kentucky, Jeff Jasper, Adam J. Kirk

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

This document serves as the final report on the construction and opening of the Roundabout Project in London, Kentucky (Kentucky Item Number 11‐904.1). This project (hereafter referred to as the London Roundabout) was constructed on the authority of the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KYTC), which received an Accelerated Innovation Deployment (AID) Demonstration grant of $1 million to offset project construction costs. The AID Demonstration program requires that award recipients submit a final report to the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) within six months of project completion. The purpose of this report is to document the project delivery and construction processes, benefits, and …

Coaxing His Data From Mandli Pavement Scans, Eric R. Green, William Nicholas Staats, Erin Lammers-Staats, Teng Alex Wang

Kentucky Transportation Center Research Report

The Kentucky Transportation Cabinet (KYTC) Division of Planning’s Highway Information Systems (HIS) database provides geometric information about horizontal and vertical curves, but its accuracy is unknown. An updated method of pavement analysis collects data by scanning the pavement as a van equipped with Mandli software drives the area of interest. The scans provide detailed information that can be used to calculate roadway geometry characteristics (e.g., curve radius, cross slope/superelevation, and grade). This study evaluated the ability of the Mandli data to support curve advisory calculations and find a way to utilize Mandli data to improve the existing HIS database. To …

Anchoring And Stiffening Techniques For Portable Concrete Barriers, Surajkumar Bhakta

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

Portable concrete barrier (PCB) systems are utilized on federal and state highways in circumstances such as placing adjacent to vertical drop-offs and in construction zones. PCB systems are most commonly used in a free-standing configuration, which are known to have relatively large deflections when impacted. Large deflections are undesirable when dealing with limited space. In order to allow PCBs to be used in space restricted locations, seven PCB anchoring and stiffening techniques were tested and evaluated as per Manual for Assessing Safety Hardware (MASH) testing standards. Results will allow the New Jersey Department of Transportation to update guidance for their …

Oct-Based Three Dimensional Modeling Of Stent Deployment, Pengfei Dong, David Prabhu, David L. Wilson, Hiram G. Bezerra, Linxia Gu

Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering: Faculty Publications

Stent deployment has been widely used to treat narrowed coronary artery. Its acute outcome in terms of stent under expansion and malapposition depends on the extent and shape of calcifications. However, no clear understanding as to how to quantify or categorize the impact of calcification. We have conducted ex vivo stenting characterized by the optical coherence tomography (OCT). The goal of this work is to capture the ex vivo stent deployment and quantify the effect of calcium morphology on the stenting. A three dimensional model of calcified plaque was reconstructed from ex vivo OCT images. The crimping, balloon expansion and …

Life Cycle Analysis For Algae Biofuels-Using Local Situations To Factor In The Cost/Benefit Of High-End Products Along With Nutrient Remediation And Co2 Sequestration, John Korstad, Joe T. Moore

College of Science and Engineering Faculty Research and Scholarship

Algae as a feedstock for commercial biofuels is best suited for sunny and warm areas with abundant fresh, salt, or brackish water. Optimum areas worldwide are in the tropics. Logical areas in North America include the Southeast Gulf coast and perhaps New Mexico. Additional practical areas on smaller scale probably lie in metropolitan locations, especially near international airports. The cost-benefit of these endeavors can be enhanced when factors such as high-end products alongside collaboration with sewage treatment or other waste water remediation, industrial carbon dioxide sequestration, reduced transport distance of fuels, and other aspects of the local economy are taken …

An Embeddable Optical Strain Gauge Based On A Buckled Beam, Yang Du, Yizheng Chen, Chen Zhu, Yiyang Zhuang, Jie Huang

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

We report, for the first time, a low cost, compact, and novel mechanically designed extrinsic Fabry-Perot interferometer (EFPI)-based optical fiber sensor with a strain amplification mechanism for strain measurement. The fundamental design principle includes a buckled beam with a coated gold layer, mounted on two grips. A Fabry-Perot cavity is produced between the buckled beam and the endface of a single mode fiber (SMF). A ceramic ferrule is applied for supporting and orienting the SMF. The principal sensor elements are packaged and protected by two designed metal shells. The midpoint of the buckled beam will experience a deflection vertically when …

Development And Characterization Of Piezoresistive Nanocomposites For Sensing Applications, Muhammad Anees

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Carbonnanotube basedhybrid nanocomposites are known to exhibit remarkable electrical and mechanical properties with many potentials in strain and damage sensing applications. In this work, we fabricate hybrid nanocomposites with carbon nanotube (CNT) sheet and graphene nanoplatelets (GNP) as fillers with epoxy matrix. An improvement in both electrical conductivity and piezoresistivity is observed with the combination of CNTs and GNPs, indicating the formation of efficient hybrid conductive networks for strain and electrical transfer in the material. Different matrix materials have been compared to investigate the effect of matrix and to choose the one that yields increased strains, flexibility, and electromechanical response. …

Computer Aided Drafting Virtual Reality Interface, David M. Roach

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Computer Aided Drafting (CAD) is pervasive in engineering fields today. It has become indispensable for planning, creating, visualizing, troubleshooting, collaborating, and communicating designs before they exist in physical form. From the beginning, CAD was created to be used by means of a mouse, keyboard, and monitor. Along the way, other, more specialized interface devices were created specifically for CAD that allowed for easier and more intuitive navigation within a 3D space, but they were at best stopgap solutions. Virtual Reality (VR) allows users to navigate and interact with digital 3D objects and environments the same way they would in the …

Analytical And Numerical Approaches On The Stiffness Of Magnetorheological Fluid Filled Spring, Stanislav Sikulskyi

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

A solid mechanical spring generally exhibits uniform stiffness. This thesis studies a mechanical spring filled with magnetorheological (MR) fluid to achieve controllable stiffness. The hollow spring filled with MR fluid is subjected to a controlled magnetic field in order to change the viscosity of the MR fluid and thereby to change the overall stiffness of the spring. MR fluid is considered as a Bingham viscoplastic linear material in the mathematical model. The goal of this research is to study the feasibility of such spring system by analytically and numerically computing the effects of MR fluid on the overall spring stiffness. …

Maritime Object Detection, Tracking, And Classification Using Lidar And Vision-Based Sensor Fusion, David John Thompson

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Autonomous Surface Vehicles have the capability of replacing dull, dirty, and dangerous jobs in the maritime field. However, few successful ASV systems exist today, as there is a need for greater sensing capabilities. Furthermore, a successful ASV system requires object detection and recognition capabilities to enable autonomous navigation and situational awareness. This thesis demonstrates an application of LiDAR sensors in maritime environments for object detection, classification, and camera sensor fusion. This is accomplished through the integration of a high-fidelity GPS/INS system, 3D LiDAR sensors, and a pair of cameras. After rotating LiDAR returns into a global reference frame, they are …