Engineering Commons^™

Engineering Education Guilds: Understanding Their Vision For Innovation, Kaitlin Mallouk, Alexandra Coso Strong, Courtney June Faber, Darby Rose Riley

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

Engineering education guilds, such as the Consortium to Promote Reflection in Engineering Education (CPREE) and the Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network (KEEN), seek to work at the forefront of educational innovation by creating networks of instructor change agents who design and implement a particular innovation in their own context to further the professional formation of engineers (PFE). While many of the innovations facilitated by CPREE and KEEN have been published extensively, it is unclear how successful the propagation of reflection and entrepreneurial mindset has been in the engineering education community. The major aim of this project is to characterize these two …

Let’S Play! Gamifying Engineering Ethics Education Through The Development Of Competitive And Collaborative Activities, Michael F. Young, Landon Bassett, Daniel D. Burkey, Scott C. Streiner, Joshua Bourne Reed

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

Engineering ethics is an extremely important topic that needs to be focused on more in engineering curricula, as many of the projects that engineers work on have a profound impact on society. There are many pitfalls with the traditional ways in which ethics is taught to engineering students as an abstract philosophical topic, rather than personal decision making situated in complex real contexts. The three main approaches that are used for engineering ethics include being taught by a professor outside of the engineering space, being taught late in their curriculum such as during a senior capstone project, and being taught …

Engineering Ethics Through High-Impact Collaborative/Competitive Scenarios (E-Ethiccs), Scott C. Streiner, Daniel D. Burkey, Michael F. Young, Richard Tyler Cimino, Jennifer Pascal

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

Engineering grand challenges increasingly involve numerous social and ethical considerations that transcend the technical skills that dominate traditional engineering education. Engineering solutions often have major, long-lasting impacts on society. Since the process of technical innovation occurs in increasingly complex social exchanges, engineers are frequently confronted with social and ethical dilemmas in their professional lives. How do students acquire the skills needed to tackle these problems? The authors hypothesize that placing engineering challenges and solutions in a classroom context while emphasizing social engagement and impact facilitates the development of engineering students as moral agents who understand the consequences of their decisions. …

Impact Of Immersive Training On Senior Chemical Engineering Students' Prioritization Of Process Safety Decision Criteria, Jeffrey Stransky, Caleb Hill, Robert John Mcerlean, Jacob Willetts, Landon Bassett, Daniel D. Anastasio, Daniel D. Burkey, Matthew Cooper, Cheryl Bodnar

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

Every year new safety features and regulations are employed within the process industry to reduce risks associated with operations. Despite these advancements chemical plants remain hazardous places, and the role of the engineer will always involve risk mitigation through real time decision making. Results from a previous study by Kongsvik et al., 2015 indicated that there were three types of decisions in major chemical plants: strategic decisions, operational decisions, and instantaneous decisions. The study showed the importance for improving upon engineers’ operational and instantaneous choices when tasked with quick solutions in the workforce. In this research study, we dive deeper …

Investigating Potential Gender Differences In First-Year Engineering Students’ Academic Motivation And Homework Submission Behavior, Cara Mawson, Cheryl Bodnar

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

Previous studies have shown that there exists a difference in undergraduate students’ academic motivation based on gender. Specifically, females have been shown to be more extrinsically motivated than their male peers in a university setting (D’Lima, et. al, 2014). However, little research has been done to examine the effects of gender relevant to academic motivation in gamified systems. The study of gamification systems is important due to the increase in their use within educational activities. This study leverages the Jones MUSIC Model of Academic Motivation and gamification profiles to answer the research question: How does gender influence student behavior and …

Student Perceptions Of An Entrepreneurial Mindset And Its Relevance To Engineering Careers, Alexandra Mary Jackson, Samantha Resnick, Rebecca Hansson, Cheryl Bodnar

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

Development of an entrepreneurial mindset (EM) has been a focus that has gained traction within engineering over the last decade. Thus, undergraduate engineering curricula have been modified to address EM development Curriculum modifications can include assigning hands-on projects with entrepreneurial elements, devoting entire courses to developing students' entrepreneurial skills while working with real world companies, and even creating degree programs with entrepreneurship in engineering as the focus.

Literature on EM has shown that there are a variety of methods for defining EM depending on the stakeholder. However, there has been limited research on how students understand and define EM, which …

Let's Talk About Ethics! A Qualitative Analysis Of First-Year Engineering Student Group Discussions Around Ethical Scenarios, L. Bassett, J. Pascal, Richard Cimino, Kevin Dahm, D. D. Burkey, Scott Streiner

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

Over the past decade, there has been a renewed interest in the scope and practice of ethics education in engineering curricula, especially in the first year. However, the form this education takes has varied considerably with each program. Active learning strategies such as discussions on ethical and societal issues have become increasingly common for assessing how students make ethical decisions. But probing the depths of the reasoning behind their decisions and how students discuss ethics in context with their peers has been under-studied and difficult. Furthermore, if first-year programs wish to implement effective instructional interventions aimed at improving ethical decision …

Integrating Design Thinking In Chemical Engineering Coursework For Enhanced Student Learning, J. P. Stengel, S. S. Jerpoth, Kirti M. Yenkie

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

In the engineering discipline, it is of utmost importance to give value to applied learning because as engineers, we are expected to innovate, and innovations happen when theoretical ideas are implemented successfully. Design thinking is one such approach that can enhance the value of theoretical concepts and motivate the students to visualize their ideas in more meaningful ways. The five stages of design thinking include: (i) Empathize, (ii) Define, (iii) Ideate, (iv) Prototype, and (v) Test. The traditional engineering curriculum focuses on the last four stages and thus leads to a skewed perspective among students with regards to problem definition, …

Development Of Innovative, Adaptable Video Learning Modules For The Civil Engineering Classroom, Sarah Bauer, Cheng Zhu, Gilson Lomboy, Mohammad Jalayer

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

As engineering and technology continue to evolve, so should the use of such innovations in engineering pedagogy. Standard course learning modules have not often utilized technology to assist in learning of engineering principles and concepts; that is, until the COVID-19 pandemic required teachers and students to use technology more frequently in a virtual teaching/learning environment. Therefore, it is even more critical now that engineering pedagogy be adapted to incorporate technology in the classroom to enhance student learning of complex engineering concepts. In this study, a team of Civil Engineering professors has set out to incorporate technology into their classrooms to …

Developing Diversity And Inclusion Initiatives And Measuring The Effects Of A Pandemic In A Civil And Environmental Engineering Department, Tiago Forin, Stephanie Farrell, Harriet Hartman, Sarah Bauer, Stephanie M. Lezotte

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

The Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) Department at Midsized Northeastern University was awarded The National Science Foundation’s Revolutionizing Engineering and computer science Departments (RED) grant in 2016 with the hopes of allowing engineering programs to improve the inclusion of minorities over the course of five years. The CEE Department used this opportunity to create a research group called Revolutionizing Engineering Diversity (RevED) that focuses on all underrepresented and underserved groups. The researchers used the grant to help change admissions as well as incorporate inclusive pedagogical practices. Currently, RevED is in the fifth year of the grant and has since spread …

Perceptions Of The Engineering Curricula From Women And Lgbtqia+ Students, Stephanie M. Lezotte, Harriet Hartman, Stephanie Farrell, Tiago Forin, Theresa F. S. Bruckerhoff

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering Departmental Research

The National Science Foundation’s Revolutionizing Engineering and computer science Departments (RED) grant was awarded to the Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) Department at Midsized MidAtlantic University in 2016. This RED grant enables the institution to improve the inclusion of underrepresented and underserved engineering students over the course of five years. One of the ways our RED research team implemented this grant was to conduct climate surveys distributed to all engineering students to document students’ academic preparation and participation, feelings of otherness in the College of Engineering, engineering self-efficacy, sense of inclusion and belonging in the College of Engineering, and their …

Lemons Into Lemonade!, Thad B. Welch, Cameron H. G. Wright, Michael G. Morrow

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper discusses a trial of offering two senior/first-year graduate classes in a 7-week format, one following the other. Thus, a student could complete two courses (6-credits), dealing with two closely related topics, in one semester. In this case, the courses were Digital Communication Systems and Wireless Communications.

During the first week of the first 7-week course, all of the in-class demonstrations and hands-on experiences needed to be shifted to online/remote delivery. This was primarily accomplished using the Amazon Web Services (AWS) AppStream, cloud computing system.

The planned real-world signal capture and analysis project changed to an optional attendance …

Development And Implementation Of An Assessment Model In A Sophomore Electromechanical Systems Design Laboratory For The Etac-Abet Accreditation, Lili Ma, Benito Mendoza, Lorrington A. Hamilton, Luis Alberto Aponte, Sergey Drabkin, Mauricio Cardena

Publications and Research

In the field of assessment in higher education, practitioners regularly mention two features as key for success at implementing a sustainable assessment model, i) it has to be faculty-driven, and ii) it has to become part of the curriculum. This paper describes an assessment model incorporating these features. The model was developed and implemented for assessing both the ETAC-ABET Program Criteria for an associate degree in Electromechanical Engineering Technology program and the new ETAC-ABET (2019-2020) student outcome (2), which regards students' ability to design systems, components, or processes for well-defined engineering technology problems appropriate to the discipline. This paper describes …

Tinkering With Theoretical Objects: Designing Theories In Scientific Inquiry, Shakayla Moran, Leslie Atkins Elliott

Curriculum, Instruction, and Foundational Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

The EDISIn Project (Engineering Design in Scientific Inquiry), taught in an undergraduate teacher preparation program, is investigating where engineering design opportunities emerge within contexts of scientific inquiry, with implications for how science teachers might productively engage in engineering design in their science courses without compromising on either the science or the engineering. In some inquiries, the opportunities for engineering were obvious, particularly with respect to novel experimental designs and in developing physical representations of models. In other inquiries, however, the investigations were either largely theoretical or the experimental designs were readily developed without a need for deliberate attention to design …

Evaluating Stem Course Re-Design Strategies In Light Of Covid-19, Ulises Juan Trujillo Garcia, Krishna Pakala, Samantha Schauer, Diana Bairaktarova, Bhaskar Chittoori

Mechanical and Biomedical Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

The COVID-19 pandemic brought on unprecedented challenges to the teaching and learning communities that required faculty to make purposeful changes in their teaching approaches. Many faculty members had to shift rapidly from in-person to online mode of instruction. This study documents perceptions of STEM faculty who made the change to online teaching. It reports on what strategies faculty used to transition to remote/online teaching and how this change impacted student learning. The study results indicated that almost two-thirds of the faculty changed how they evaluated their students. Results also showed that the sudden change to remote learning negatively impacted student …

Solar Energy Certificate For Engineering Technology Students, Jesus A. Gonzalez-Rodriguez, Immanuel Edinbarough

Manufacturing & Industrial Engineering Faculty Publications

Solar Energy is the fastest-growing energy resource in the United States and the world. This industry just hit an important milestone in 2019 of completing two million solar systems installations in the country and is expected to duplicate this quantity by 2023.

Organizations and home and business owners in our South Texas region are starting to recognize the benefits of this type of renewable energy. And with the drop in the cost of the components and installation of the solar system, the future for this industry seems promising.

Our Program of Engineering Technology, which is part of the College of …

Embedded Curriculum With Industry-Recognized Certifications To Improve The Marketability Of Engineering Technology Graduates, Immanuel Edinbarough, Jesus A. Gonzalez-Rodriguez

Manufacturing & Industrial Engineering Faculty Publications

Embedded Curriculum with Industry Recognized Certifications to Improve the Marketability of Engineering Technology Graduates

The Fourth Industrial Revolution is challenging the industries to change the way they manage and operate the manufacturing environment. This leads to the transformation of the world through artificial intelligence, next-generation robotics, automation, big data analytics, 5G technology and Internet of Things. This idea of Industry 4.0 forces the change in the industries of today and tomorrow. In this, cyber physical systems communicate with one another using the Internet of Things. The manufacturing sector takes full advantage of these technologies to produce innovative products to enhance …

Improvement Of Spice Based Esd Protection Models For I/O Protection Modeling, Amin Pak, Seyed Mostafa Mousavi, David Pommerenke, Giorgi Maghlakelidze, Yang Xu

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Modeling ESD protection using the System Efficient ESD Design (SEED) methodology enables optimal protection of an IO using TVS and external components. The success of modeling depends on the accuracy of the models. This work shows improvements to SPICE models used to characterize TVS diodes and IC I/O. The improvement is twofold. The transition phases between snapback and main current flow have been adjusted to achieve realistic waveforms for the rise times from 500 ps to 5 ns in a voltage range from Vt1 to the high current region, and complex curvatures of the IV curve are included. The model …

Data-Driven Discovery Of The Governing Equation For The Transmission Lines System, Yanming Zhang, Lijun Jiang

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Sophisticated structures in the transmission line system introduce the nonuniformity and nonlinearity, which brings the challenge for its characterization and modeling. In this work, a novel data-driven method is proposed to derive the governing partial differential equations of the transmission line. Based on the polynomial interpolation of the spatial-temporal samples of current and voltage, the time and spatial derivatives can be obtained. Then, the ridge regression algorithm is adopted to determine the active spatial differential terms from the candidate functions. Three benchmarks, the uniform and nonuniform transmission line, and a soliton generation system, are provided to demonstrate the validity of …

It’S A Context Gap, Not A Competency Gap: Understanding The Transition From Capstone Design To Industry, Marie C. Paretti, Julie Dyke Ford, Susannah Howe, Daria A. Kotys-Schwartz, Robin Ott

Engineering: Faculty Publications

This paper describes the completion of a multi-year, multi-institution study to explore students’ transitions from capstone design courses into engineering workplaces. Numerous studies and industry reports point to gaps between school and work with respect to engineering practice. Such misalignment poses a serious challenge to the professional formation of engineers within the academy. Industry-oriented capstone courses are key opportunities to bridge these gaps. These courses provide a direct connect to industry, and faculty view them as vehicles to help students synthesize prior coursework and engage in real-world projects. Yet few if any studies have examined the effectiveness of capstone courses …

The Impact Of Micro Porous Layer On Liquid Water Evolution Inside Pemfc Using Lattice Boltzmann Method, Mitchell Sepe, P. Satjaritanun, I. V. Zenyuk, N. Tippayawong, Sirivatch Shimpalee

Faculty Publications

Proton exchange membrane fuel cells (PEMFCs) require a gas diffusion layer to aid in fuel transport to the catalyst sites. A microporous layer (MPL) is often added to the GDL to improve liquid saturation inside gas diffusion media. In this work, the lattice Boltzmann method was applied to four GDL samples with the addition of an MPL. Three injection orientations were used to study liquid evolution through the samples. Each orientation used four different injection pressures, ranging from 5,000 Pa to 8,000 Pa. Saturation data for GDL samples with and without an MPL were compared. Results showed that when adding …

Hardware Acceleration In Image Stitching: Gpu Vs Fpga, Joshua David Edgcombe

Masters Theses

Image stitching is a process where two or more images with an overlapping field of view are combined. This process is commonly used to increase the field of view or image quality of a system. While this process is not particularly difficult for modern personal computers, hardware acceleration is often required to achieve real-time performance in low-power image stitching solutions. In this thesis, two separate hardware accelerated image stitching solutions are developed and compared. One solution is accelerated using a Xilinx Zynq UltraScale+ ZU3EG FPGA and the other solution is accelerated using an Nvidia RTX 2070 Super GPU. The image …

Assessment Of Creative Thinking In An Introductory Robotics Course Using Final Project, Lili Ma, Jose Reyes Alamo, Yu Wang

Publications and Research

This study describes development of an assignment (the final project) used for assessment of creative thinking in an undergraduate robotic course. Robotics inherently demands creativity, requiring exploration and investigation among several different methods to eventually generate a satisfactory solution. Assessment of students’ creative thinking fits naturally into our robotic course, which has a 2.5-hour lab session each week for students to work on physical/simulated robots. Students are asked to complete three projects over one semester. This paper describes the re-design and fine-tuning of the final project such that assessment of creative thinking can be incorporated into this robotic course as …

Hydrolearn: Improving Students’ Conceptual Understanding And Technical Skills In A Civil Engineering Senior Design Course, Melissa Ann Gallagher, Jenny Byrd, Emad Habib, David G. Tarboton, Clinton S. Wilson

Civil and Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

Engineering graduates need a deep understanding of key concepts in addition to technical skills to be successful in the workforce. However, traditional methods of instruction (e.g., lecture) do not foster deep conceptual understanding and make it challenging for students to learn the technical skills, (e.g., professional modeling software), that they need to know. This study builds on prior work to assess engineering students’ conceptual and procedural knowledge. The results provide an insight into how the use of authentic online learning modules influence engineering students’ conceptual knowledge and procedural skills. We designed online active learning modules to support and deepen undergraduate …

Water Regulation For Enhancing Soil Quality Using Cactus Mucilage: A Theoretical And Experimental Analysis, Khuloud Alrashdi

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

As water is one of the primary sources of life, it is essential in an endless number of systems and processes to be utilized efficiently in nature and in practical applications. One of these applications includes farming, which depletes a lot of water as the water irrigation systems cover large soil areas. While water is a critical factor in growing crops, a question here stands, can the irrigation process be transformed? This is the overarching goal of my work since it is centered on studying if cactus mucilage, a natural substance, is capable of improving water absorption processes on crops …

Building A Functional Cardiograph Over Four Semesters, Part 3: Estimating Heart Rate And Respiration Rate In The Time And Frequency Domains Using Matlab, Gail Baura, Francisca Fils-Aime, Vincent Chiun-Fan Chen, Leanne Kallemeyn

Engineering Science Faculty Publications

At Loyola University Chicago (LUC), all engineering courses are taught using a mandatory minimal lecture style, where the majority of course meeting time is devoted to group activities. Each activity may take place during that course meeting only, over the entire semester, or over multiple semesters. Curricular contextual threads take place over multiple semesters. One such contextual thread is the cardiograph project, whereby students build a functional cardiograph that estimates heart rate (HR) and respiration rate (RR) over four semesters (first, third, fifth, and sixth semesters). In Part III, students acquire their own electrocardiogram (ECG) using a custom motherboard, with …

Evaluation Of Fine And Coarse Graded Asphalt Mixes, Md Mehedi Hasan

Civil Engineering ETDs

During the last 20 years, asphalt pavements were built in New Mexico (NM) and around the country using mostly Superpave coarse graded mixes as opposed to fine graded mixes. This is because coarse mix uses larger aggregates with good interlocking and requires less asphalt binder than a fine mix, while both mixes fulfill the Superpave criteria. Recently, it was observed nationally that the Superpave coarse graded mixes have good field rutting performances but poor cracking performances. It is hypothesized that fine graded mix can help improve pavement cracking performances. The idea is, the fine mixes would have less air voids …

Effects And Solutions On The Human Body After Long-Duration Space Flights, Jose Jaime Esquivel Patricio

McNair Research Journal SJSU

During the Cold War, President John F. Kennedy made it a mission for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to accomplish a lunar landing and return to Earth. The final lunar landing and the last time humans left Low Earth Orbit (LEO) was in December, 1972. However, 47 years have passed and the fascination with traveling into deep space remains alive and flourishing. A major problem with future human missions to Mars is the effects of microgravity and Mars’ 0.38g environment. Unfortunately, space medicine is limited and little is known about the effects of microgravity on the human body …

Issue 9: Contributors, D. Flournoy, Randall Johnson

Online Journal of Space Communication

List of issue 9 contributors.

Gps & Galileo: Prospects For Building The Next Generation Of Global Navigation Satellite Systems, Glen Gibbons Jr.

Online Journal of Space Communication

In the next 5 to 10 years, the world will experience the emergence of a true Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) - a compatible and, in many respects, interoperable system of systems. The U.S. Global Positioning System, Europe's Galileo, perhaps Russia's Glonass system, and regional augmentations including the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS), the European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service (EGNOS), radiobeacon-based systems such as the U.S. Nationwide Differential GPS, and compatible commercial differential correction services will comprise this multifaceted GNSS. Common signal structures and frequency plans will enable combined user equipment that reduces the technical complexity and cost, while vastly …