Engineering Commons^™

Multi-Dimensional Extension Of The Alternating Minimization Algorithm In X-Ray Computed Tomography, Jingwei Lu

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

X-ray computed tomography (CT) is an important and effective tool in medical and industrial imaging applications. The state-of-the-art methods to reconstruct CT images have had great development but also face challenges. This dissertation derives novel algorithms to reduce bias and metal artifacts in a wide variety of imaging modalities and increase performance in low-dose scenarios. The most widely available CT systems still use the single-energy CT (SECT), which is good at showing the anatomic structure of the patient body. However, in SECT image reconstruction, energy-related information is lost. In applications like radiation treatment planning and dose prediction, accurate energy-related information …

Thermal And Physico-Mechanical Characterizations Of Thromboresistant Polyurethane Films, Aaron C. Wilson, Shih-Feng Chou, Roberto Lozano, Jonathan Y. Chen, Pierre F. Neuenschwander

Mechanical Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Hemocompatibility remains a challenge for injectable and/or implantable medical devices, and thromboresistant coatings appear to be one of the most attractive methods to down-regulate the unwanted enzymatic reactions that promote the formation of blood clots. Among all polymeric materials, polyurethanes (PUs) are a class of biomaterials with excellent biocompatibility and bioinertness that are suitable for the use of thromboresistant coatings. In this work, we investigated the thermal and physico-mechanical behaviors of ester-based and ether-based PU films for potential uses in thromboresistant coatings. Our results show that poly(ester urethane) and poly(ether urethane) films exhibited characteristic peaks corresponding to their molecular configurations. …

The Potential Energy States And Mechanical Properties Of Thermally Cycled Binary Glasses, Nikolai V. Priezjev

Mechanical and Materials Engineering Faculty Publications

The influence of repeated thermal cycling on mechanical properties, structural relaxation, and evolution of the potential energy in binary glasses is investigated using molecular dynamics simulations. We consider a binary mixture with strongly non-additive cross interactions, which is annealed across the glass transition with different cooling rates and then exposed to one thousand thermal cycles at constant pressure. We found that during the first few hundred transient cycles, the potential energy minima after each cycle gradually decrease and the structural relaxation proceeds via collective, irreversible displacements of atoms. With increasing cycle number, the amplitudes of the volume and potential energy …

Elevated Temperature Mechanical And Microstructural Characterization Of Slm Ss304l, G. R. Hecht, Sriram Praneeth Isanaka, Joseph William Newkirk

Materials Science and Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

SLM built SS304L was annealed and water quenched to minimize residual stress and avoid carbide precipitation. Mini-tensile characterization of strength and elongation at temperature conditions up to 800°C, along with observations of the associated microstructural transformations were utilized to understand the changes produced in SLM SS304L. As-built and annealed specimens were found to exhibit decreasing strength and elongation with increasing temperature as expected. Carbide precipitates appeared after short times at high temperatures within both as-built and annealed specimens for all cases, but no brittle intermetallic phase development was observed for any of the temperatures investigated. While the lack of Sigma, …

Frequency Inspection Of Additively Manufactured Parts For Layer Defect Identification, Aimee Allen, Kevin Johnson, Jason R. Blough, Andrew Barnard, Troy Hartwig, Ben Brown, David Soine, Tristan Cullom, Douglas A. Bristow, Robert G. Landers, Edward C. Kinzel

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Additive manufactured (AM) parts are produced at low volume or with complex geometries. Identifying internal defects is difficult as current testing techniques are not optimized for AM processes. The goal of this paper is to evaluate defects on multiple parts printed on the same build plate. The technique used was resonant frequency testing with the results verified through Finite Element Analysis. From these tests, it was found that the natural frequencies needed to detect the defects were higher than the excitation provided by a modal hammer. The deficiencies in this range led to the development of other excitation methods. Based …

Joining Of Copper And Stainless Steel 304l Using Direct Metal Deposition, Xinchang Zhang, Yitao Chen, Tan Pan, Wenyuan Cui, Lan Li, Frank W. Liou

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

In the current study, the feasibility of joining pure copper (Cu) and stainless steel 304L (SS304L) through direct metal deposition process was investigated by material characterization. Samples were analyzed in terms of microstructure, elemental distribution, and tensile testing. Direct depositing pure copper on SS304L shows copper was mechanically rather than metallurgical bonded with SS304L due to the poor dissolubility of iron in copper. Iron was diffused into copper with a diluted distance of 1.5 mm and above that, pure copper deposits were obtained. Columnar structure was observed at the copper region near the interface while the columnar grains became finer …

Simulated Effect Of Laser Beam Quality On The Robustness Of Laser-Based Am System, Aaron Flood, Frank W. Liou

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

In many metal AM techniques, a laser is used as the heat source and in some applications, it can be advantageous to work off of the focal plane. When operating outside of focus, the beam quality of the laser can have drastic impacts on the ability to manufacture quality parts. This study investigates the effect of the beam quality and distance from the focal plan on the ability to deposit Ti-64, aluminum, and steel through the simulation of the blown powder process.

In-Situ Local Part Qualification Of Slm 304l Stainless Steel Through Voxel Based Processing Of Swir Imaging Data, Cody S. Lough, Xin Wang, Robert G. Landers, Douglas A. Bristow, James A. Drallmeier, Edward C. Kinzel

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

This paper demonstrates the potential for qualification through local part property prediction of 304L stainless steel parts manufactured by Selective Laser Melting (SLM). This is accomplished through voxel based processing of SWIR imaging data measured in-situ. Thermal features are extracted from time-series SWIR imaging data recorded from layer-to-layer to generate 3D point cloud reconstructions of parts. The voxel based data is indexed with localized measurements of SLM part properties (light-to-dark microstructural feature ratio, microhardness, μCT data) to demonstrate the correlations. Various features are extracted from the thermal history for comparison of their respective abilities to predict the resulting local part …

Evaluation Of Low And High Frequency Dynamic Response For Condition Assessment Of Reinforced Concrete Structures, Ali Hafiz

Dissertations and Theses

Concrete is widely used for civil infrastructure structures and they experience deterioration and degradation due to aging, increases in the traffic loads, harsher environmental conditions, use of deicing chemicals, etc. Therefore, evaluating the integrity of reinforced concrete structures has become of increasing interest for infrastructure owners and managers. A number of non-destructive testing (NDT) and structural health monitoring (SHM) methods have been developed in recent decades to aid in evaluating structures and provide input for asset management. One family of these methods uses the dynamic response of a structural member: stress waves (high frequency) and structural vibrations (low frequency). Both …

Generalized Beam–Spring Model For Predicting Elastic Behavior Of Partially Composite Concrete Sandwich Wall Panels, Salam Al-Rubaye, Taylor Sorensen, Robert J. Thomas, Marc Maguire

Faculty Publications

Partially composite sandwich wall panels (SWP) have been used in the construction industry for at least twenty years. Currently there is limited codified guidance for designers of partially composite concrete SWP, but they are being designed safely and routinely. Design is often guided by the composite connector manufacturers who sell proprietary composite connectors often using a variation of truss-type matrix methods for prediction of elastic behavior of SWPs. The purpose of this paper is to quantify the accuracy of such a model in a uniform manner by developing a generalized version of these matrix models called the beam-spring model (BSM). …

Compressive And Bending Performance Of Selectively Laser Melted Alsi10mg Structures, D. Murphy, O. Fashanu, Myranda Spratt, Joseph William Newkirk, K. Chandrashekhara, H. Misak, D. Klenosky

Materials Science and Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Selective laser melting (SLM) is a widely used additive manufacturing technique that effectively manufactures complex geometries such as cellular structures. However, challenges such as anisotropy and mechanical property variation are commonly found due to process parameters. In a bid to utilize this method for the commercial production of cellular structures, it is important to understand the behavior of a material under different loading conditions. In this work, the behavior of additively manufactured AlSi10Mg under compression, bending, and tension loads was investigated. Vertical and horizontal build directions are compared for each type of loading. Specimens were manufactured using the reduced build …

Comparison Of Fatigue Performance Between Additively Manufactured And Wrought 304l Stainless Steel Using A Novel Fatigue Test Setup, M. M. Parvez, Y. Chen, Joseph William Newkirk, Frank W. Liou

Materials Science and Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

In this research, a novel adaptive controlled fatigue testing machine was designed for bending type high cycle fatigue test. A unique dual gauge section Krouse type mini specimen was designed for simply supported transverse bending. Displacement controlled fatigue tests were implemented using an electromechanical actuator. The variation in the control signal and load observed during the test provides unique insights into realizing the deterioration of the specimen due to fatigue. These analyses were utilized to compare the fatigue performance of wrought and additively manufactured 304L stainless steel. The influence of the build direction on fatigue performance was also investigated by …

Effective Elastic Properties Of Additively Manufactured Metallic Lattice Structures: Unit-Cell Modeling, Okanmisope Fashanu, David Murphy, Myranda Spratt, Joseph William Newkirk, K. Chandrashekhara, Ben Brown, John Porter

Materials Science and Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Lattice structures are lightweight materials, which exhibit a unique combination of properties such as air and water permeability, energy and acoustic absorption, low thermal conductivity, and electrical insulation. In this work, unit-cell homogenization was used to predict the effective elastic moduli of octet-truss (OT) lattice structures manufactured using selective laser melting (SLM). OT structures were manufactured using a Renishaw AM 250 SLM machine with various relative densities. Compression test was carried out at strain rate 5 x 10^-3 m^-1 using an MTS frame. Finite element analysis was used in the determination of the OT’s effective elastic properties. Results …

Dynamic Defect Detection In Additively Manufactured Parts Using Fea Simulation, Kevin Johnson, Aimee Allen, Jason R. Blough, Andrew Barnard, David Labyak, Troy Hartwig, Ben Brown, David Soine, Tristan Cullom, Edward C. Kinzel, Douglas A. Bristow, Robert G. Landers

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

The goal of this paper is to evaluate internal defects in additively manufactured (AM) parts using FEA simulation. The resonant frequencies of parts are determined by the stiffness and mass involved in the mode shape at each resonant frequency. Voids in AM parts will change the stiffness and mass therefore shift the resonant frequencies from nominal. This paper will investigate the use of FEA to determine how much a void size, shape, and location will change the resonant frequencies. Along with where the optimal input and response locations are in order to find these frequency changes. The AM part evaluated …

Frequency Domain Measurements Of Melt Pool Recoil Pressure Using Modal Analysis And Prospects For In-Situ Non-Destructive Testing, Tristan Cullom, Nicholas Altese, Douglas A. Bristow, Robert G. Landers, Ben Brown, Troy Hartwig, David Soine, Aimee Allen, Andrew Barnard, Jason Blough, Kevin Johnson, Edward C. Kinzel

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Fielding Additively Manufactured (AM) parts requires evaluating both the part’s geometry and material state. This includes geometry that may be optically hidden. Both the geometry and material state affect the vibration response of the parts and modal analysis (identifying natural frequencies) has been shown to be effective for at least simple geometries using ex-situ methods (shaker table and impact hammer excitations). This paper investigates evaluation of the frequency response of metal parts inside the build chamber using the process laser to excite the parts during printing (Renishaw AM250). Vibrations in the part are measured with accelerometers connected to the build …

The Effect Of Cell Size And Surface Roughness On The Compressive Properties Of Abs Lattice Structures Fabricated By Fused Deposition Modeling, Leah Mason, Ming-Chuan Leu

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Researchers looking to improve the surface roughness of acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) parts fabricated by fused deposition modeling (FDM) have determined that acetone smoothing not only achieves improved surface roughness but increases compressive strength as well. However, the sensitivity of ABS parts to acetone smoothing has not been explored. In this study we investigated FDM-fabricated ABS lattice structures of various cell sizes subjected to cold acetone vapor smoothing to determine the combined effect of cell size and acetone smoothing on the compressive properties of the lattice structures. The acetone-smoothed specimens performed better than the as-built specimens in both compression modulus …

Application Of Schlieren Technique In Additive Manufacturing: A Review, R. Bharadwaja, Aravind Murugan, Yitao Chen, Frank W. Liou

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Additive manufacturing has gained a lot of attention in the past few decades due to its significant advantages in terms of design freedom, lower lead time, and ability to produce complex shapes. One of the pivotal factors affecting the process stability and hence the part quality is the shielding gas flow in additive manufacturing. As extremely beneficial for the process, the shielding gas flow is often set at maximum supply to achieve enough gas cover over the substrate. This causes excessive quantity of shielding gas to be unutilized. Realizing the importance of shielding gas, various studies have been carried out …

Applications Of Supervised Machine Learning Algorithms In Additive Manufacturing: A Review, M. S. Joshi, Aaron Flood, Todd E. Sparks, Frank W. Liou

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Additive Manufacturing (AM) simplifies the fabrication of complex geometries. Its scope has rapidly expanded from the fabrication of pre-production visualization models to the manufacturing of end use parts driving the need for better part quality assurance in the additively manufactured parts. Machine learning (ML) is one of the promising techniques that can be used to achieve this goal. Current research in this field includes the use of supervised and unsupervised ML algorithms for quality control and prediction of mechanical properties of AM parts. This paper explores the applications of supervised learning algorithms - Support Vector Machines and Random Forests. Support …

Part Remanufacturing Using Hybrid Manufacturing Processes, Xinchang Zhang, Frank W. Liou

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Many users of high-performance metal parts, such as the aerospace industry, the mold/die casting industry, and heavy machinery consumers, extend the service of these damaged parts by employing remanufacturing technology. Additive manufacturing has unique capabilities, such as low heat input, a small heat-affected zone, free-form fabrication, and a near-net-shape. This paper summarizes the effort and the tested results to achieve an automated remanufacturing process using hybrid additive manufacturing and CNC machining processes. It will enable the robust remanufacturing-on-demand to significantly increase operational availability to reduce sustainment costs, thus will lead to robust and quality remanufacturing that is critical for remanufacturing …

Design And Validation Of A Modular Instrument To Measure Torque And Energy Consumption In Industrial Operations, Mary De La Cruz, Ramiro Gonzalez, Jesus A. Gomez, Atilano Mendoza, Javier A. Ortega

Mechanical Engineering Faculty Publications

A modular torque measuring instrument capable of performing tapping torque tests (TTT) according to the ASTM D-5619 standard was designed, developed, and validated. With this new instrument, the performance of different lubricants can be evaluated in terms of frictional torque and energy consumption during tapping processes. This instrument can adapt onto any conventional milling machine or CNC machine and operate under various machining operations such as tapping, drilling, and other processes. To validate the design and performance of this new device, three commercially available lubricants were evaluated. From the three tested conditions, the results showed good repeatability, with consistent results …

Information Technology News, Georgia Southern University

Information Technology: News & Publications (2012-2023)

• Welcome New Students

Soil-Bentonite Slurry Trench Cutoff Wall Bore Logs, Jeffrey C. Evans

NSF Soil-Bentonite Slurry Trench Cutoff Wall Documents

Bore logs for the soil-bentonite slurry trench cutoff wall constructed in Montandon Pennsylvania.

Simplified 2d Skin Lattice Models For Multi-Axial Camber Morphing Wing Aircraft, Bashir Alsaidi, Woong Yeol Joe, Muhammad Akbar

Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering Faculty Research

Conventional fixed wing aircraft require a selection of certain thickness of skin material that guarantees structural strength for aerodynamic loadings in various flight modes. However, skin structures of morphing wings are expected to be flexible as well as stiff to structural and coupled aerodynamic loadings from geometry change. Many works in the design of skin structures for morphing wings consider only geometric compliance. Among many morphing classifications, we consider camber rate change as airfoil morphing that changes its rate of the airfoil that induces warping, twisting, and bending in multi-axial directions, which makes compliant skin design for morphing a challenging …

Imaging Of Glucose Metabolism By 13c-Mri Distinguishes Pancreatic Cancer Subtypes In Mice, Shun Kishimoto, Jeffrey R. Brender, Daniel R. Crooks, Shingo Matsumoto, Tomohiro Seki, Nobu Oshima, Hellmut Merkle, Penghui Lin, Galen Reed, Albert P. Chen, Jan Henrik Ardenkjaer-Larsen, Jeeva Munasinghe, Keita Saito, Kazutoshi Yamamoto, Peter L. Choyke, James Mitchell, Andrew N. Lane, Teresa W. M. Fan, W. Marston Linehan, Murali C. Krishna

Center for Environmental and Systems Biochemistry Faculty Publications

Metabolic differences among and within tumors can be an important determinant in cancer treatment outcome. However, methods for determining these differences non-invasively in vivo is lacking. Using pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma as a model, we demonstrate that tumor xenografts with a similar genetic background can be distinguished by their differing rates of the metabolism of 13C labeled glucose tracers, which can be imaged without hyperpolarization by using newly developed techniques for noise suppression. Using this method, cancer subtypes that appeared to have similar metabolic profiles based on steady state metabolic measurement can be distinguished from each other. The metabolic maps from …

College Of Engineering News, Georgia Southern University

College of Engineering & Computing: News & Publications (2010-2023)

• Annual Awards for Faculty and Staff

Monitoring Silane Sol-Gel Kinetics With In-Situ Optical Turbidity Scanning And Dynamic Light Scattering, Abul Bashar Mohammad Giasuddin, David W. Britt

Biological Engineering Faculty Publications

Organosilanes (e.g., R’-SiOR₃) provide hydrophobic functionality in thin-film coatings, porous gels, and particles. Compared with tetraalkoxysilanes (SiOR₄), organosilanes exhibit distinct reaction kinetics and assembly mechanisms arising from steric and electronic properties of the R’ group on the silicon atom. Here, the hydrolysis and condensation pathways of n-propyltrimethoxy silane (nPM) and a tri-fluorinated analog of nPM, 3,3,3-trifluoropropyl trimethoxy silane (3F), were investigated under aqueous conditions at pH 1.7, 2.0, 3.0, and 4.0. Prior to hydrolysis, 3F and nPM are insoluble in water and form a lens at the bottom (3F) or top (nPM) of the solutions. This …

Optimizing The Valorization Of Industrial By-Products For The Induction Healing Of Asphalt Mixtures, Amir Tabakovic, Marta Vila-Cortavitarte, Daniel Jato-Espino, Daniel Castro-Fresno

Articles

Self-healing within asphalt pavements is the process whereby road cracks can be repaired automatically when thermal and mechanical conditions are met. To accelerate and improve this healing process, metal particles are added to asphalt mixtures. However, thisapproach is costly both in economic and environmental terms due to the use of virgin metallic particles. So, even though the self-healing of asphalt mixtures has been widely addressed in experimental terms over the years, there is a lack of research aimed at modelling this phenomenon, especially with the purpose of optimizing the use of metal particles through the valorization of industrial by-products. As …

Acute Angle Repositioning In Mobile C-Arm Using Image Processing And Deep Learning, Armin Yazdanshenas

Mechanical Engineering Theses

During surgery, medical practitioners rely on the mobile C-Arm medical x-ray system (C-Arm) and its fluoroscopic functions to not only perform the surgery but also validate the outcome. Currently, technicians reposition the C-Arm arbitrarily through estimation and guesswork. In cases when the positioning and repositioning of the C-Arm are critical for surgical assessment, uncertainties in the angular position of the C-Arm components hinder surgical performance. This thesis proposes an integrated approach to automatically reposition C-Arms during critically acute movements in orthopedic surgery. Robot vision and control with deep learning are used to determine the necessary angles of rotation for desired …

Linking Cellular Activity To Brain Tumors | College Of Engineering, Utah State University

College of Engineering News

A team of researchers at Utah State University is tackling one of the newest questions in cancer research: Is cellular blebbing associated with the development of tumors?

Hydcem: A New Cement Hydration Model, Niall Holmes, Denis Kelliher, Mark Tyrer

Conference papers

Hydration models are useful to predict, understand and describe the behaviour of different cementitious-based systems. They are indispensable for undertaking long-term performance and service life predictions for existing and new products for generating quantitative data in the move towards more sustainable cements while optimising natural resources. One such application is the development of cement-based thermoelectric applications.

HYDCEM is a new model to predict the phase assemblage, degree of hydration, heat release and changes in pore solution chemistry over time for cements undergoing hydration for any w/c ratio and curing temperatures up to 450C. HYDCEM, written in MATLAB, is aimed at …