Engineering Commons^™

Final Report - Microwave Camera For Concrete Delamination And Steel Corrosion Detection, Chao Liu, Mohammad T. Al Qaseer, Reza Zoughi

Project SN-4

This project studied the capability of microwave methods to detect thickness of induced corrosion byproduct on rebars embedded into concrete, and also similarly embedded delamination. Three microwave methods used or investigated included microwave synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imaging method, microwave resonance method, and microwave nonlinear measurement. Wideband, low-frequency antennas including a double-ridged horn and a Vivaldi antenna were designed for achieving reasonable spatial resolution while being able to penetrate lossy concrete. Simulations and experiments were conducted for all of these investigations. For the rebar samples use, the results showed that the corrosion thickness was very small (~50 m) which seemed …

Final Report - Battery-Free Antenna Sensors For Strain And Crack Monitoring Of Bridge Structures, Yang Wang, Dan Li

Project SN-2

This project studies a wireless patch antenna as a novel strain/crack sensing technique for structural health monitoring (SHM). The strain/crack induced resonance frequency shift of the antenna can be wirelessly detected and utilized to estimate the surface strain and crack propagation. However, temperature fluctuation can generate some unwanted changes in resonance frequency and introduce significant noises in measurement. This project studies a thermally stable patch antenna sensor through both numerical simulations and laboratory experiments. Using a substrate material with a steady dielectric constant, a patch antenna sensor is designed to perform reliably under temperature fluctuations. In addition, a dual-mode patch …

Low Dose Uv-B Induced Keratinocyte Exosomes Protect Schwann Cells Against High Glucose Injury, Kartheek Pothana

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

In this study, we tested the protective effect of UV-B treated HG-HaCaT-Exos on Schwann cells (SCs) injured by HG (high glucose) model. At first, we determined the dose of UV-B radiation and the time for the release of HaCaT-Exos. Furthermore, the Schwann cells were injured through the HG model, isolated by ultracentrifugation from the HaCaT cell culture supernatant were co-incubated within the injured cells. It was found that UV-B treated HaCaT-Exos decrease apoptosis and increase the viability of injured SC by transferring miR-222 from HaCaT cells to them via exosomes, hence protecting them.

Design And Implementation Of Simplified Sliding-Mode Control Of Pwm Dc-Dc Converters For Ccm, Humam A. Al-Baidhani

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

The pulse-width modulated (PWM) dc-dc converters play a vital role in several industrial applications that include motor drives, electric vehicles, dc distribution systems, and consumer electronics. The switched-mode power converters step the input voltage up or down based on their typology and provide a regulated output voltage. The stability and regulation performance of a power converter can tremendously be improved via a suitable control design. However, due to the nonlinearity of the power converters and the presence of the line and load disturbances, the design of a robust and low-cost control circuit becomes a challenging task. The sliding-mode control of …

Irish Construction Cross Border Trade And Brexit: Practitioner Perceptions On The Periphery Of Europe, Tara Brooks, Lloyd Scott, John P. Spillane, Katy Hayward

Articles

The United Kingdom (UK) Brexit vote of June 2016 has created unprecedented uncertainty in the construction industry in Ireland but little research to date has been undertaken on existing construction trading patterns and the potential effects of regulatory divergence and other nontariff barriers in Ireland in this context. In response, this study uses mixed methods to fill this gap in knowledge. The experience of nine construction industry interviewees is probed – five based in Northern Ireland (in the UK) and four from Ireland, which will remain in the EU after the UK leaves. The researchers’ analysis of the qualitative data …

Advancement Of Predictive Modeling Of Zeta Potentials (Ζ) In Metal Oxide Nanoparticles With Correlation Intensity Index (Cii), Andrey A. Toropov, Natalia Sizochenko, Alla P. Toropova, Danuta Leszczynska, Jerzy Leszczynski

Articles

It was expected that index of the ideality of correlation (IIC) and correlation intensity index (CII) could be used as possible tools to improve the predictive power of the quantitative model for zeta potential of nanoparticles. In this paper, we test how the statistical quality of quantitative structure-activity models for zeta potentials (ζ, a common measurement that reflects surface charge and stability of nanomaterial) could be improved with the use of these two indexes. Our hypothesis was tested using the benchmark data set that consists of 87 measurements of zeta potentials in water. We used quasi-SMILES molecular representation to take …

Steel Model Approval: Can Bim Provide A Drawing-Free Approval Process?, Bim Tudublin, David Reynolds

Capstone Reports

Despite widespread use of Building Information Modelling (BIM) software used within their industry, the approval of steelwork contractor’s design information is largely based on the approval of 2d-drawings. These workflows can be modernised to take advantage of current technology and provide productivity gains, but barriers to change exist. This research is an attempt to answer the research question of if a model-based approval process, which removes the need for drawings, is achievable. To answer this question, a mixed methodology was used. A literature review was performed to understand how the approval process works, what information is required and what BIM …

A Comparative Study Of Cadworx Plant 2018 And Revit 2020 With Ez-Iso Add-In, For The Production Of Piping Isometrics, Bim Tudublin, Killian Lynch

Capstone Reports

BIM software evaluation and selection is a complex process. In this paper, a comparative study of Revit 2020 with Ez-ISO add-in, and CADWorx Plant 2018, was carried out. The aim of this study was to determine if a MEP contractor could consolidate software usage into one package, thereby reducing costs for pipework modelling and isometric production. A comprehensive evaluation was developed based on a literature review. A multicriteria decision-making method was used in conjunction with the software evaluation to ensure sound choices were made. An online survey of senior BIM professionals was conducted to validate the analysis and findings. The …

A Critical Appraisal Of Findings And Solutions To Overcome Erroneous Bim Model Production And Information Delivery Workflows, Bim Tudublin, Ryan Forde

Capstone Reports

There are many varying definitions of Building Information Modelling, all of which reflect its transformative capabilities and impact on the construction sector. BIM is an emerging technological and procedural shift within the AEC industry (Succar, 2009). BIM is not just a technological change, but also a procedural and workflow change (Charles Eastman, 2018). Despite the growth of BIM adoption and increasing levels of maturity regarding BIM standards, numerous issues still arise at a micro level during project execution. BIM invokes the need for workflows, frameworks and processes that imparts knowledge, heightens trust, increases efficiency and consistency while reducing fragmentation and …

A Critical Examination Of The Use Of Business Intelligence (Bi) In The Optioneering Of Generative Design Models: A Case Study., Bim Tudublin, Davitt Lamon

Capstone Reports

This research outlines the development of a generative des ign workflow for the architectural space planning of a 1,200 sq.m office located in Dublin, Ireland, and the application of statistical analysis and data visualisation for the optioneering of gen erated models. First, the paper defines a computational desig n model with the potential to generate a variety of office layouts, including circulation routes and desk locations. It then identifies three unique performance metrics that evaluate each design option. Finally, the study applies a multi objective genetic algorithm (MOGA) to explore the high dimensional design space of all potential options and …

Thermophotovoltaic Systems For Achieving High-Solar-Fraction Hybrid Solar-Biomass Power Generation, Cm Iftekhar Hussain, Aidan Duffy, Brian Norton

Articles

Medium operating temperature hybrid solar-biomass TPV power plant design requires complex integration of multiple high temperature processes with low band-gap TPV cells. A 0.72 eV band-gap GaSb TPV cell has been used in thermophotovoltaic (TPV) systems operating at temperatures above 1400 °C. Low band-gap TPV cells, such as InGaAs (Eg = 0.55 eV) and InAs (Eg = 0.36 eV) could enable a TPV system to operate optimally at temperatures ≈1000 °C. To examine this, two hybrid solar-biomass TPV system configurations are studied using TRNSYS simulation that incorporates a new algorithm for TPV. It is found that in a high solar …

Análisis Por Confiabilidad Del Modelo De Diseño Aashto 93 Para Pavimentos Flexibles En El Valle De Aburrá, Mario Santiago Hernández, Juan Pablo Osorio, Juan Camilo Viviescas

Books/Book Chapters

La necesidad de construir pavimentos con mejores especificaciones técnicas y mayores períodos de servicio requiere de una modelación rigurosa de la variabilidad en las propiedades geotécnicas con el fin de garantizar la confiabilidad de estas estructuras. Por lo tanto, se realizó un análisis basado en la confiabilidad del método Aashto-93, considerando la variabilidad geotécnica del suelo, asociada al módulo resiliente de la subrasante. Los diseños por confiabilidad fueron efectuados de acuerdo con las categorías, parámetros y estructuras establecidas por el Manual de diseño de pavimentos asfálticos en vías con medios y altos volúmenes de tránsito, de 1998, del Instituto Nacional …

A Preconditioned Lattice Boltzmann Flux Solver For Steady Flows On Unstructured Hexahedral Grids, Brendan Walsh, Fergal Boyle

Articles

The lattice Boltzmann flux solver (LBFS), first introduced by Shu et al. (2014) on structured meshes, allows fluid flow problems to be solved on unstructured meshes discretised by the finite volume method. The solver calculates the macroscopic fluxes at the cell interfaces from a local reconstruction of the lattice Boltzmann solution. In this paper the LBFS is extended to three-dimensional unstructured hexahedral meshes and a preconditioned lattice Boltzmann flux solver (PLBFS) is presented. The PLBFS involves applying the preconditioning technique proposed by Guo (2004) to the LBFS and is achieved by modifying the equilibrium distribution function used to calculate the …

Is It Time To Give Athletes A Voice In The Dissemination Strategies Of Concussion-Related Information? Exploratory Examination Of 2444 Adolescent Athletes, Mark Beakey, Brian Keenan, Stephen Tiernan, Kieran Collins

Other Resources

Objective: The objective of the research was to screen male and female adolescent athletes on their concussion educational histories and preferred future methods of education in terms of educational messenger, modality, and concussion-related areas of interest.

Design: Cross-sectional survey.

Setting: Examination setting within the classroom.

Participants: Adolescent male (n = 1854) and female (n = 590) athletes aged 12 to 18 years.

Main outcome measures: To explore the concussion educational histories and preferred future methods of education in Irish male and female adolescent athletes.

Results: 19.7% (n = 482) of the sample received education in the past 12 months. Male …

Developing An Inclusive K-12 Outreach Model, Karen Nolan, Roisin Faherty, Keith Quille, Brett A. Becker, Susan Bergin

Conference Papers

This paper outlines the longitudinal development of a K-12 outreachmodel, to promote Computer Science in Ireland. Over a three-yearperiod, it has been piloted to just under 9700 K-12 students fromalmost every county in Ireland. The model consists of a two-hourcamp that introduces students to a range of Computer Sciencetopics: addressing computing perceptions, introduction to codingand exploration of computational thinking. The model incorporateson-site school delivery and is available at no cost to any interestedschool across Ireland. The pilot study so far collected over 3400surveys (pre- and post-outreach delivery).Schools from all over Ireland self-selected to participate, includ-ing male only, female only and …

Named Entity Recognition In Spanish Biomedical Literature: Short Review And Bert Model, Liliya Akhtyamova

Conference Papers

Named Entity Recognition (NER) is the rst step for knowledge acquisition when we deal with an unknown corpus of texts. Having received these entities, we have an opportunity to form parameters space and to solve problems of text mining as concept normalization, speech recognition, etc. The recent advances in NER are related to the technology of word embeddings, which transforms text to the form being effective for Deep Learning. In the paper, we show how NER detects pharmacological substances, compounds, and proteins in the dataset obtained from the Spanish Clinical Case Corpus (SPACCC). To achieve this goal, we use contextualized …

Land-Based Wind Energy Cost Trends In Germany, Denmark, Ireland, Norway, Sweden And The Unitedstates, Aidan Duffy, Maureen Hand, Ryan Wiser, Eric Lantz, Alberto Dalla Riva, Volker Berkhout, Maria Stenkvist, David Weir, Roberto Lacal-Arántegui

Articles

This paper presents work by the International Energy Agency’s Task 26 ‘Cost of Wind Energy’ on technological and cost trends in land-based wind energy in six participating countries (Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, United States) and the European Union between 2008 and 2016. Results indicate that there is a general trend towards larger, taller machines with lower specific powers resulting in higher capacity factors, despite small falls in new site wind resources in most countries, while wind project capital costs and project finance costs also fell. This resulted in an average levelized cost of energy (LCOE) fall of 33% for …

Experimental Evaluation Of Medium-Voltage Cascode Gallium Nitride (Gan) Devices For Bidirectional Dc–Dc Converters, Salah Salem H. Alharbi

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As renewable energy sources, such as photovoltaic (PV) cells and wind turbines, are rapidly implemented in DC microgrids, energy storage systems play an increasingly significant role in ensuring uninterrupted power supply and in supporting the reliability and stability of microgrid operations. Power electronics, especially bidirectional DC–DC converters, are essential parts in distributed energy storage and alternative energy systems because of their grid synchronization, DC power management, and bidirectional power flow capabilities. While there is increasing demand for more efficient, compact, and reliable power converters in numerous applications, most existing power converters are hindered by traditional silicon (Si) based semiconductors, which …

Volumetric Flow Measurement For Irrigation District Turnouts, Charles M. Burt, Daniel J. Howes, Stuart Styles

BioResource and Agricultural Engineering

Technical assistance related to irrigation district turnout flow/volumetric measurement is provided by ITRC on behalf of California Dept. of Water Resources, USBR, and BIA irrigation projects. Throughout that work, it was apparent there was a need to organize well-established information as well as to provide new insights into irrigation flow measurement. The target audiences are irrigation districts and others who want to improve measurement accuracy for irrigation flow rates and volumetric deliveries to meet regulations, improve the efficiency of ditchriders (system operators), and provide equity and transparency to farmers and managers. The focus of this publication is on turnouts (deliveries) …

Discharge Coefficients For Rectangular Suppressed And Submerged Sluice Gates, Charles M. Burt, Albert J. Clemmens, Kyle Feist

BioResource and Agricultural Engineering

Two sizes of sluice gates were tested in submerged conditions with a variety of flow rates and gate openings. A new equation was developed for flow rate prediction.

Annual Report 2019-2020, Depaul University College Of Computing And Digital Media

CDM Annual Reports

LETTER FROM THE DEAN

As I write this letter wrapping up the 2019-20 academic year, we remain in a global pandemic that has profoundly altered our lives. While many things have changed, some stayed the same: our CDM community worked hard, showed up for one another, and continued to advance their respective fields. A year that began like many others changed swiftly on March 11th when the University announced that spring classes would run remotely. By March 28th, the first day of spring quarter, we had moved 500 CDM courses online thanks to the diligent work of our faculty, staff, …

A Framework For Strategic Decision-Making In Construction Professional Service Firms, Oluwasegun O. Seriki

Doctoral

The construction sector plays a crucial role in the global economy, having critical importance to economic growth, social inclusion and employment. In Ireland, the sector generates a combined value of over €20 billion per annum, with 144,000 persons directly employed in the sector, which is forecasted to grow by 3.9% in 2019. The sector is also hugely complex due to the diverse range of output, from productive infrastructure (roads, railways etc.) to residential (both public and private) and the numerous stakeholders involved throughout its intricate supply chain. The sector is highly susceptible to cyclical economic patterns, making it more challenging …

Perceived Importance And Levels Of Technical English Communication Skills Among Stakeholders In Engineering Fields, Roger Tsz Ho Ng, Alex Ying Yin Wong

Faculty of Science & Technology (THEi)

The purposes of this study were to examine stakeholders’ perceptions of the importance of technical English communication skills in engineering and academic teachers and industry professionals’ perceptions of current engineering students’ and graduates’ levels of technical communication skills. Survey questionnaires were designed to collect data from different research participants. The data were subsequently analysed using descriptive statistics. The study identified a discrepancy between students’ self-perceived performance on technical English communication skills and their perceived standards of these skills required by the programmes in which they were enrolled. Technical communication skills, including writing in engineering genres, essays and technical reports, reading …

Enhancing Protection Of Vehicle Drivers And Road Safety By Deploying Adas And Facial Features Pattern Analysis (Ffpa) Technologies, Raymond Sze Wai Fu, Xueying Wang, Antonio Wong, Chi-Wing Tsang

Faculty of Science & Technology (THEi)

The latest technology associated with Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) have been designed with the aim to minimize the numbers of person injury in road accidents and improve the overall road safety. The driver behavior is one major concern in many accidents in HK urban road links. In particular, the driver's attitudes, such as fatigue, drowsiness and concentration are the major causes to road accidents. It will affect the driver's ability and decisions in properly controlling their vehicles. Very often, this kind of driver distraction is particularly obvious when driving after 2 to 3 hours from most research sources. In the …

An Experimental Study To Measure The Concentration Of Nanofluids By Using Refractive Index, Kwan Ng, Man Hei Chau

Staff Publications

In a decade, nanofluids are a new kind of fluid that has rapid development and wide application in various fields. Especially, nanofluids as a heat transfer fluids in different industrial instead of the traditional heat transfer fluids such as water, oil, and ethylene glycol…etc. The nanofluids have consisted the nano-size metal or metal oxide pArticles with base fluids, the nanoparticles have a superior thermo property to enhance the heat transfer performance of based fluids. Concentration is an important factor that can be influenced by most of the thermal properties of nanofluids. In present, the concentration of nanofluids is predetermined, the …

Information Visualization Of Metacognitive Skills During The Software Development Process Based On An Adapted Engineering Design Metacognitive Questionnaire, R. R. Adisurya, H. B. Santoso, S. Fadhilah, Oenardi Lawanto

Engineering Education Faculty Publications

In software development, either alone or in a team, there are many aspects that determine the success in developing the software, including each developer's skills. Studies show that the application of metacognition can increase the effectiveness and efficiency of software development. To measure a metacognition skill, there need to be a metacognition measurement tools. One example of this measurement method is adapted engineering design metacognitive questionnaire. However, the respondents feel that existing tools still have not given them any benefits. This research is conducted to develop an information visualization tools for the metacognition measurement from an adapted engineering design metacognitive …

Seed-Mediated Crystallization Of Charge-Transfer Complexes And Their Applications For Gas Sensing, Xuecheng Yu

Wayne State University Dissertations

The dissertation focused on controllable seed-mediated nucleaton of charge transfer complex, namely tetrathiafulvalene bromide ((TTF)Br) and Krogmann’s salts (KCP), and their applications in sensing. On gold nanoparticle (AuNP) decorated highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG) substrate, the presence of AuNP promotes the formation of charge transfer salt nanowires. The size of these nanowires, both (TTF)Br and KCP, were found to be confined by the size of AuNPs, shown by SEM and AFM characterization. On micro-disk electrodes, charge transfer salt nanowires were found to own a linear time dependency, by both SEM and in-situ optical microscopy. The micro-disk electrodes promoted higher crystallization …

Timcc: On Data Freshness In Privacy-Preserving Incentive Mechanism Design For Continuous Crowdsensing Using Reverse Auction, Xiaoqiang Ma, Weiwei Deng, Feng Wang, Menglan Hu, Fei Chen, Mohammad Mehedi Hassan

Faculty and Student Publications

© 2013 IEEE. As an emerging paradigm that leverages the wisdom and efforts of the crowd, mobile crowdsensing has shown its great potential to collect distributed data. The crowd may incur such costs and risks as energy consumption, memory consumption, and privacy leakage when performing various tasks, so they may not be willing to participate in crowdsensing tasks unless they are well-paid. Hence, a proper privacy-preserving incentive mechanism is of great significance to motivate users to join, which has attracted a lot of research efforts. Most of the existing works regard tasks as one-shot tasks, which may not work very …

Semi-Annual Progress Report #6, Missouri University Of Science And Technology. Inspire - University Transportation Center

Semi-Annual Progress Reports

No abstract provided.

Inexpensive Fluid Flow Visualization In A Microfluidic Channel Experiment Overview, Maoling Chu

Bridges: A Journal of Student Research

Flow visualization is vital to describe the motion of a fluid in microfluidic channels. This paper summarizes and lists systems based on two common visualization technique categories: particle-based techniques and scalar-based techniques. For this experiment, microfluidic channels were created using PDMS (polydimethylsiloxane). Based on our results and many fabrication trials, it was difficult to say whether this experiment was easy or inexpensive. If the first channel made by the researchers had successfully worked, it would have been clear that utilizing PDMS to fabricate a microfluidic channel for flow visualization was cheap and easy. However, no fully successful microfluidic chips were …