Engineering Commons^™

A Mixed Method Study On The Impact Of Industry Sponsored Projects On Senior Capstone Design Student’S Motivational Factors, Devanshi Shah

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines the change in student motivation through a yearlong senior capstone design course with respect to their choice of project type. The senior capstone design projects offered at the university fall into one of two major project types: industry sponsored and nonindustry sponsored. The students opt for either of the two major project types based on their interest and future career goals. The students were given an adapted version of Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ) to self-identify their motivation levels by rating various questions on a 7-point Likert scale. The surveys were conducted at two different points …

Airport Taxiway Traversal And Safety Optimization Using Combinatorics, Thore Groenlund Rasmussen

Theses and Dissertations

The demand for air travel has increased dramatically in the last decade, putting large strain on airports and their limited resources. Expanding the available resources at an airport is not always an option either due to location, budget or time. This forces the administrators of an airport system to use the limited resources as efficiently as possible. This thesis proposes a tool for air traffic controllers and pilots that can be used when planning taxiway systems. Taking inspiration from Dijkstra’s Algorithm, an algorithm is proposed to safely move aircraft from the terminal to the runway. Applying constraints to the algorithm …

Experimental And Numerical Analysis Of The Drag Force On Surfboards With Different Shapes, Omar Lahlou

Theses and Dissertations

The aim of the present study is to define the hydrodynamic resistance of surfboards with different designs. Decreasing the drag acting on a board helps the surfer to attain higher surfing performances. It helps to attain higher speeds and maneuvering for the surfer. In this thesis, theoretical, experimental and computational approaches are used to explain how the drag changes with different surfboard shapes. Four surfboards with varying shapes were towed at different speeds and the resulting force was recorded. Two computational models were developed using Star CCM and Flowsquare to confirm the experimental results. The drag force on the boards …

Calibration Of The Rapidscat Microwave Brightness Temperature, Ali Al-Sabbagh

Theses and Dissertations

NASA RapidScat is the first satellite scatterometer that flown in non-Sun-synchronous orbit. Its unique orbit enabled collocated measurements with multiple satellite remote-sensing instruments that usually fly in Sun-synchronous orbits. RapidScat’s primary mission was retrieval of global ocean wind vectors from normalized radar backscatter measurements. The instrument operated onboard the International Space Station between September 2014 and August 2016 covering latitude range between ±51.6ᵒ . To serve as a cross-calibration reference with other instruments, RapidScat must be internally calibrated. This dissertation presents the first radiometric calibration of RapidScat brightness temperature measurements and describes the process that combines RapidScat’s active/passive mode, simultaneously …

A Sensor Fusion And Machine Learning Approach For Predicting Signal Power Path Loss In Wireless Communications, Yunus Egi

Theses and Dissertations

When it comes to Wireless Communication systems and their optimization in different environments, estimation of SPPL for different terrain models becomes one of the most tedious problems for Radio Frequency engineers. Since every terrain has their complex terrain structures and contains micro-variations, they end up with an ambiguous SPPL via scattering and absorption. Also, modern SPPL prediction models are error free since they use predefined estimation parameters for classified terrain model. Sometimes, terrain-related estimation errors may cause over undesirable SPPL level which is much larger than 5% tolerance error. To avoid this problem, one can benefit from 3D map of …

Simulating Alternative Tuberculosis Diagnosis Methods In Underdeveloped Countries, Luke Turner

Industrial Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Tuberculosis is the deadliest infectious disease in the world; it is especially rampant in underdeveloped countries because they do not have the infrastructure, technology, or funding to properly combat the infection. However, the development of portable point-of-care diagnosis machines can reverse this epidemic as they far surpass conventional laboratory identification. The question now is where to place these machines, which is a difficult decision with a lack of data. Therefore, a flexible simulation model is created to test the implementation of these machines with different countries and configurations. The simulation tests the baseline model and three proposed implementations of the …

Silicone Tadpole: Research Into Soft Bodies, Danielle Fernandez

Mechanical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

In this thesis, research is conducted in the area of soft robotics by building a soft tadpole that can deform with a specific air pressure. The goal is to mimic the motion of an organic tadpole in respect to its S-shaped tail movement. The angle of deformation, derived from material mechanic theories, ranges from 45 to 80 degrees for this type of movement. The design includes a head compartment which acts as a tank to transfer nitrogen pressure and a tail section that receives the said pressure and bends as a result. The tail section was designed with two rows …

Construction Of A Hyperspectral Camera Using Off-The-Shelf Parts And 3d-Printed Parts, Connor Heo

Mechanical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

The Arkansas Center for Space and Planetary Sciences (ACSPS) is working together with the Mechanical Engineering Department to build a modifiable camera with 3D-printed parts and off-the-shelf parts (sourced from Edmund Optics and Amazon). The design is to be readily changeable, primarily with the 3D printed parts, as to accommodate new ideas and functionalities in the future. Ultimately, the camera should be relatively cheap while maintaining functionality for proposed use cases. Earlier versions of the design will be tested extensively and rapidly updated in the ACSPS labs with benchtop testing. This will involve subjects with both visible and infrared emissions, …

Design Of A Scara Based Mobile 3d Printing Platform, Zachary Hyden

Mechanical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Currently 3D printers rely heavily on people to run them, there is no automatic way to start a new print after one has finished. On top of this 3D printers are limited in the area they can print on. Even though the additive manufacturing market is rapidly growing and is increasingly being used in product manufacturing there has yet to be a solution to this problem. This research proposes using mobile 3D printing robots to solve both of these issues. The proposed prototype utilizes a Selective Compliance Assembly Robot Arm (SCARA) based robot capable of cooperatively manufacturing parts. This allows …

3d Printing A Microfluidic Chip Capable Of Droplet Emulsion Using Ninjaflex Filament, Robert Andrews

Mechanical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

This paper details an investigation into methods and designs of 3D printing a microfluidic system capable of droplet emulsion using NinjaFlex filament. The specific field in which this paper’s experiment is rooted is dubbed “BioMEMS,” short for bio microelectromechanical systems. One prominent research area in BioMEMS is developing a “lab on a chip.” Essentially, the goal is to miniaturize common lab processes to the micro scale, rendering it possible to include these processes in a small chip. Reducing necessary sample sizes, shortening the reaction times of lab processes, and increasing mobility of lab processes can all be realized through microfluidic …

Design Of Artificial Swarms Using Network Motifs: A Simulation Study, Khoinguyen Trinh

Mechanical Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

The objective of this research is to develop a new approach in engineering complex swarm systems with desired characteristics based on the theory of network motifs – subgraphs that repeat themselves (patterns) among various networks. System engineering has traditionally followed a top-down methodology which creates a framework for the system and adds additional features to meet specific design requirements. Meanwhile, complex swarm systems, such as ant colonies and bird flocks, are formed via a bottom-up manner where the system-level structure directly emerges from the interactions and behaviors among individuals. The behaviors of these individuals cannot be directly controlled, which makes …

Cure: Flexible Categorical Data Representation By Hierarchical Coupling Learning, Songlei Jian, Guansong Pang, Longbing Cao, Kai Lu, Hang Gao

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

The representation of categorical data with hierarchical value coupling relationships (i.e., various value-to-value cluster interactions) is very critical yet challenging for capturing complex data characteristics in learning tasks. This paper proposes a novel and flexible coupled unsupervised categorical data representation (CURE) framework, which not only captures the hierarchical couplings but is also flexible enough to be instantiated for contrastive learning tasks. CURE first learns the value clusters of different granularities based on multiple value coupling functions and then learns the value representation from the couplings between the obtained value clusters. With two complementary value coupling functions, CURE is instantiated into …

Role Of Local Renin-Angiotensin System In Potentiating Early Calcific Aortic Valve Disease, Jessica Perez

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Angiotensin-II (Ang-II), a peptide hormone, is a potent vasoconstrictor and cell mitogen. It has been implicated in the development of hypertension as well as atherosclerosis. Recent work has shown that sclerotic aortic valves possess expression of angiotensin type I receptor (AT-1R) and angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE), suggesting altered angiotensin signaling during disease. The role of altered angiotensin signaling on aortic valve mechanics, however, is not clearly understood. We seek to understand the direct effects of the renin angiotensin signaling (RAS) system on the biological and biomechanical properties of aortic valve tissue and develop a finite constitutive model that mimics the …

Quantitative Detection Of Complex Mixtures Using A Single Chemical Sensor: Analysis Of Response Transients Using Multi-Stage Estimation, Karthick Sothivelr, Florian Bender, Fabien Josse, Edwin E. Yaz, Antonio J. Ricco

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

Most chemical sensors are only partially selective to any specific target analyte(s), making identification and quantification of analyte mixtures challenging, a problem often addressed using arrays of partially selective sensors. This work presents and experimentally verifies a signal-processing technique based on estimation theory for online identification and quantification of multiple analytes using only the response data collected from a single polymer-coated sensor device. The demonstrated technique, based on multiple stages of exponentially weighted recursive least-squares estimation (EW-RLSE), first determines which of the analytes included in the sensor response model are absent from the mixture being analyzed; these are then eliminated …

Towards Fully Additively-Manufactured Permanent Magnet Synchronous Machines: Opportunities And Challenges, Fan Wu, Ayman M. El-Refaie

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

With the growing interest in electrification and as hybrid and pure electric powertrains are adopted in more applications, electrical machine design is facing challenges in terms of meeting very demanding performance metrics for example high specific power, harsh environments, etc. This provides clear motivation to explore the impact of advanced materials and manufacturing on the performance of electrical machines. This paper provides an overview of additive manufacturing (AM) approaches that can be used for constructing permanent magnet (PM) machines, with a specific focus on additively-manufactured iron core, winding, insulation, PM as well as cooling systems. Since there has only been …

A Survey Of Prediction And Classification Techniques In Multicore Processor Systems, Cristinel Ababei, Milad Ghorbani Moghaddam

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

In multicore processor systems, being able to accurately predict the future provides new optimization opportunities, which otherwise could not be exploited. For example, an oracle able to predict a certain application's behavior running on a smart phone could direct the power manager to switch to appropriate dynamic voltage and frequency scaling modes that would guarantee minimum levels of desired performance while saving energy consumption and thereby prolonging battery life. Using predictions enables systems to become proactive rather than continue to operate in a reactive manner. This prediction-based proactive approach has become increasingly popular in the design and optimization of integrated …

The Impacts Of Administering Metabolites Of Saccharomyces Cerevisiae On Broiler Performance, Yields And Salmonella Content Of Component Portions, Bill Douglas Potter

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The impacts of using health-promoting Saccharomyces cerevisiae fermentation metabolites in poultry production and processing can be measured in respect to multiple measures of success. Traditionally this yeast-based compound has been administered to poultry, livestock, poultry, and other species to improve animal performance and production volume output. In addition, Saccharomyces cerevisiae fermentation metabolites have also been shown in more recent research to reduce colonization of pathogenic bacteria in the host organism’s gastro-intestinal tract. In this dissertation, the impacts of administering a functional ingredient containing Saccharomyces cerevisiae metabolites on broiler performance measures and pathogen reduction were measured. One of the studies in …

Synchrophasor-Based Fault Location Detection And Classification, In Power Systems, Using Artificial Intelligence, Hemal Falak

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

With the introduction of sophisticated electronic gadgets which cannot sustain interruption in the provision of electricity, the need to supply uninterrupted and reliable power supply, to the consumers, has become a crucial factor in the present-day world. Therefore, it is customary to correctly identify fault locations in an electrical power network, in order to rectify faults and restore power supply in the minimum possible time. Many automated fault location detection algorithms have been proposed, however, prior art requires topological and physical information of the electrical power network. This thesis presents a new method of detecting fault locations, in transmission as …

Hardware Ip Classification Through Weighted Characteristics, Brendan Mcgeehan

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Today’s business model for hardware designs frequently incorporates third-party Intellectual Property (IP) due to the many benefits it can bring to a company. For instance, outsourcing certain components of an overall design can reduce time-to-market by allowing each party to specialize and perfect a specific part of the overall design. However, allowing third-party involvement also increases the possibility of malicious attacks, such as hardware Trojan insertion. Trojan insertion is a particularly dangerous security threat because testing the functionality of an IP can often leave the Trojan undetected. Therefore, this thesis work provides an improvement on a Trojan detection method known …

Asynchronous Circuit Synthesis Using Multi-Threshold Null Convention Logic, Nicholas Renoudet Mize

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

As the demand for an energy-efficient alternative to traditional synchronous circuit design grows, hardware designers must reconsider the traditional clock tree. By doing away with the constrains of a clock, asynchronous sequential circuit designs can achieve a much greater level of efficiency. The utilization of asynchronous logic synthesis flows has enabled researchers to better implement asynchronous circuit designs which have been optimized using the same industry standard tools that are already used in sequential synchronous designs. This thesis offers a new flow for such tools which implements the MTNCL asynchronous circuit architecture.

Towards A Prototype Platform For Ros Integrations On A Ground Robot, Taylor Joseph Linville Whitaker

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The intent of this work was to develop, evaluate, and demonstrate a prototype robot platform on which ROS integrations could be explored. With observations of features and requirements of existing industrial and service mobile ground robots, a platform was designed and outfitted with appropriate components to enable the most common operational-critical functionalities and account for unforeseen components and features. The resulting Arlo Demonstration Robot accommodates basic mapping, localization, and navigation in both two and three-dimensional space as well as additional safety and teleoperation features. The control system is centered around the Zybo Z7 FPGA SoC hosting a custom hardware design. …

H2 Control For Improved Stability Of Multi-Area Electric Power System With High Levels Of Inverter-Based Generation, Muthanna Abdulkareem Al-Sarray

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Increased generation capacity from non-dispatchable energy resources such as wind and solar has created challenges to ensuring the reliable delivery of electric power. This research develops a systematic three-step method of assessing the reliability of electric power systems under a variety of different possible fault conditions to ensure that overall system stability is preserved in a manner the meets regulatory requirements. The first step is a risk-based reliability method (RBRM) that accounts for the probability of a line outage versus the severity of impact. This allows system planners to judiciously allocate expenses for reliability improvements based on the greatest economic …

Optical Enhancement In Periodic Plasmonic Gratings For Sers And Metal-Semiconductor-Metal Photodetectors (Msm-Pds) Applications, Ahmad Aziz Darweesh

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation is aimed to numerically study the effect of plasmonic grating electrodes on the efficiency of metal-semiconductor-metal photodetectors (MSM PDs) and the sensitivity of Surface Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy (SERS). This research can benefit many areas of nanoscience and optics, including plasmonic applications, such as, super lenses, nano-scale optical circuits, optical filters, surface plasmon enhanced photo-detectors solar cells, imaging sensors, charge-coupled devices (CCD), and optical-fiber communication systems. Several parameters, wire widths and thickness, gap space, taper angle, and the incident wavelength and angle, were investigated. The goal of this research is to utilize the plasmonic phenomenon by using plasmonic gratings …

A Silicon Germanium Cmos Linear Voltage Regulator For Wireless Agricultural Applications, Aminta Naidili Castillo Robles

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis presents the design, simulation and test results of a silicon germanium (SiGe) complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) linear regulator. The objective of the circuit is to power other analog devices regardless of the load current and input voltage changes. The application of this regulator is to be part of a project developing a miniaturized semiconductor platform that can be inserted into stems of crops in order to measure data inside the plant and then send it wirelessly to the user. The linear regulator was designed on a BiCMOS SiGe 0.13µm which is a GlobalFoundries process. It has been tested at …

Plasmonic Properties Of Nanoparticle And Two Dimensional Material Integrated Structure, Desalegn Tadesse Debu

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Recently, various groups have demonstrated nano-scale engineering of nanostructures for optical to infrared wavelength plasmonic applications. Most fabrication technique processes, especially those using noble metals, requires an adhesion layer. Previously proposed theoretical work to support experimental measurement often neglect the effect of the adhesion layers. The first finding of this work focuses on the impact of the adhesion layer on nanoparticle plasmonic properties. Gold nanodisks with a titanium adhesion layer are investigated by calculating the scattering, absorption, and extinction cross-section with numerical simulations using a finite difference time domain (FDTD) method. I demonstrate that a gold nanodisk with an adhesive …

Characterization Of Hydride Vapor Phase Epitaxy Grown Gan Substrates For Future Iii-Nitride Growth, Alaa Ahmad Kawagy

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The aim of this research is to investigate and characterize the quality of commercially obtained gallium nitride (GaN) on sapphire substrates that have been grown using hydride vapor phase epitaxy (HVPE). GaN substrates are the best choice for optoelectronic applications because of their physical and electrical properties. Even though HVPE GaN substrates are available at low-cost and create the opportunities for growth and production, these substrates suffer from large macro-scale defects on the surface of the substrate.

In this research, four GaN on sapphire substrates were investigated in order to characterize the surface defects and, subsequently, understand their influence on …

Segmentation And Registration Based Automatic Cancer Proton Treatment Analysis, Yang Zhang

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Due to its low side effects, proton therapy is rapidly developing around the world. However, the time and labor it takes to deliver the treatment have prevented widespread use in the clinic setting. For this reason, an automatic proton treatment analysis system is needed to improve efficiency during the treatment process.

The challenge lies in improving the accuracy and speed of the current proton treatment analysis system. The Range shifter correction factor is considered the same value under any given condition in our treatment system. This approximate algorithm limits the accuracy of the proton treatment analysis system. In addition, medical …

Cell Imaging And Data Analysis For Biomaterial-Mammalian Co-Cultures, Jefferson Pontsler

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Microscopic bioimaging is a useful approach to study cell-biomaterial interactions which are vital to the biomedical application of biomaterials. Through microscopic imaging, numerous cellular responses, such as proliferation, uptake, and death, can be recorded, characterized and analyzed.

In this thesis, I first provided basic introductions to the imaging techniques and analysis tools, especially those that are highly relevant to the studies of biomaterials and cell interactions. I also detailed the adaptation of these techniques and tools in the application of two specific research projects in biomaterials, with special focuses on the imaging and analysis.

The first project assessed the subtle …

Comparison Of Induced And Parasitic Drag On Wings With Minimum Induced Drag, Sarah A. Abdel-Motaleb

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Minimizing the induced drag for steady level flight is a variational problem that requires solving for the optimum lift distribution given a set of design constraints. From lifting-line theory, minimizing the induced drag is, in part, achieved by varying the Fourier coefficients used to describe the section lift. The elliptic lift distribution minimizes the induced drag for a wing with fixed weight and wingspan by setting all but the first coefficient to zero. If wingspan is allowed to vary, a negative third Fourier coefficient is utilized to reach an optimum lift distribution that further reduces the induced drag for stress-limited …

A Swimming Open-Water Navigation Assistive Headset And Receiver, Zakk B. Rhodes

All Graduate Plan B and other Reports, Spring 1920 to Spring 2023

Open water swimming is a common activity dating back to ancient times. One challenge with open water swimming is navigation because while maintaining proper swimming technique suggests the head be in the water, it is difficult to see where one is going. Thus swimmers must bring their head out of the water periodically to sight landmarks. This work describes a solution to this problem by a design for a GPS device to assist swimmers with navigation. The swimmer can plan their own route, send it to the device, and then be guided by the device. They then will not have …