Engineering Commons^™

Theme Parks, Staycation Practices, And Covid-19: Opportunities And Uncertainties, Salvador Anton Clavé

Journal of Themed Experience and Attractions Studies

The effects of COVID-19 on the market transformation of the theme park industry has been significant in the short term because of travel restrictions. Challenges, impacts, responses, and strategies might vary from one region to another and even from one theme park to another. However, it can be assumed that domestic travel will continue to have an effect on the theme park industry during the months to come and likely beyond the pandemic. In this context, the “staycation” is becoming a booming trend in the leisure, entertainment, and tourism industry, creating new, current, and future unexpected economic winners and losers. …

Disney During Covid-19: The Tourist And The Actor’S Nightmare, Jennifer A. Kokai, Tom Robson

Journal of Themed Experience and Attractions Studies

In this essay, we argue that the experience of being at Disney theme parks in COVID times was a waking version of what is sometimes called “The Actor’s Nightmare.” Due to safety regulations, theme parks either dropped live entertainment that structures the day as a show with a clear beginning and end (e.g. park-opening rope drop performances, and the fireworks), attempted to include references to COVID in live entertainment (like in

the Frozen Ever After singalong, which added some COVID jokes), or to ignore it (like the Festival of the Lion King). In any case, due to these measures the …

The “Politics Of Inclusion/Exclusion” In Times Of The Pandemic, Florian Freitag

Journal of Themed Experience and Attractions Studies

As commercial enterprises that depend on attracting a maximum number of visitors in order to be economically successful, theme parks have generally been careful to avoid unpleasant, sensitive, or controversial themes (or aspects of a theme) that might offend or alienate potential customers. Due to official regulations concerning e.g. the wearing of masks in waiting lines and during rides, however, the pandemic cannot simply be “excluded” from the parks and remains constantly visually present, thus seriously undermining the companies’ efforts to keep the park grounds rigidly separated from the rest of the world. Particular operational decisions by some theme park …

“It Takes People To Make The Dream A Reality”: Disney’S Hr Strategy In Response To Covid-19, Jaime L. Williams, Allison A. Toth

Journal of Themed Experience and Attractions Studies

From January 2020 to the beginning of fall 2021, theme parks around the world have been required to engage in abnormal, abrupt, and major shifts in operations caused by the ongoing global pandemic (COVID-19). Through the process of sensemaking, this paper will focus on the human resources related decisions made by The Walt Disney Company in an effort to better understand the organization’s responses to changes in the external environment and the resulting outcomes during the pandemic. The overall management of Cast Members in the United States during this time period with specific focuses on the layoff and re-hiring of …

Are European Theme Parks Likely To Suffer From Long Covid?, Pieter Cornelis

Journal of Themed Experience and Attractions Studies

COVID-19 has had a major impact on the theme park industry. Visits to European parks were significantly lower in 2020 than the year before. This article discusses the short-term and long-term economic consequences of the pandemic for the theme park industry. Attitudinal loyalty, inertia effects of guest satisfaction on repeat visits, (deferred) reinvestments, and the difference between theme and amusement parks will be considered. To compensate for losses in 2020, many parks increased their visitor numbers in the 2021 season to the maximum permitted capacity, especially in the summer months. As a result, analysis of waiting times at 22 investigated …

Introduction: Theme Parks And Covid-19, Salvador Anton Clavé, Florian Freitag

Journal of Themed Experience and Attractions Studies

In the tourism industry, “crises” have been conceptualized as local and temporary phenomena, interval states that may require imminent action, but that can eventually be overcome, with business simply resuming. At the moment of writing, however, it is not at all clear when or if the theme park sector can simply return to a pre-pandemic state of affairs. Even if tourism may once again attain pre-COVID numbers, it may well be through entirely new and different forms. The essays collected here provide scholarly and professional snapshots of the current (winter 2021/2022) state of the theme park industry, with special attention …

Hydrodynamic Signatures Of Recreational Boat Wakes And Their Influence To Sediment Entrainment Along The Shoreline Of A Shallow Estuary, Kelly M. Kibler

Predicting Boat Wake Bank Erosion Risk

Wave energy from recreational boat wakes is associated with erosion and degradation of shoreline ecotones. However, wake effects are often assumed to be negligible when boating lanes are located far from shore. In this study, field experiments were conducted to characterize hydrodynamics of recreational boat wakes at the shoreline of a shallow estuary as offshore sailing-line distance varied from 50 to 200m. Results indicate that wake events were considerably more energetic than ambient conditions, with an average 20% increase in wave height, 190% increase in near-bed orbital velocity, and 110% increase in wave-induced shear stress. Wake events generated farther from …

Design, Optimization, And Construction Of Flexure, Optical, Damping, And Leveling Systems For Electric Propulsion Thrust Stand, Logan Hefferan

Honors Theses

An Thrust Stand is a device that uses the basic principles of torsion and displace­ment to experimentally measure and calculate the thrust generated by an Electric Propulsion (EP) Thruster. Western Michigan University is host to three organiza­tions that work with electric propulsion thrusters currently without a way of ob­taining direct experimental thrust data. For this Senior Design Project, the flexure, optical sensing, damping and leveling systems for a thrust stand originally designed by Hannah Watts in her WMU Honors Thesis: Design of A Thrust Stand for Elec­tric Propulsion [13] will be constructed. The four subsystems will be redesigned, optimized, and …

Research On Credibility Assessment Of Cloud Simulation System, Wei Li, Huan Zhang, Ping Ma, Ming Yang

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: The cloud simulation platform supports the "cloud simulation" mode, which can automatically find simulation resources and dynamically build the cloud simulation system. Because the cloud simulation platform has the characteristics of simulation services establishment on demand and multi-granularity resources sharing, the credibility evaluation of the cloud simulation system faces new challenges in the credibility of the simulation resources, the credibility of the simulation subsystems and the reliability of the simulation environment, etc. From the whole life cycle perspective of the cloud simulation system, the credibility evaluation process model and the credibility evaluation index system of the cloud simulation system …

Evaluating Ramp Meter Wait Time In Utah, Tanner Jeffrey Daines

Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this research was to develop an algorithm that could predict ramp meter wait time at metered freeway on-ramps throughout the state of Utah using existing loop detector systems on the ramps. The loop detectors provided data in 60-second increments that include volume, occupancy, and the metering rate. Using these data sources, several ramp meter queue length algorithms were applied; these predicted queue lengths were then converted into wait times by using the metering rate provided by the detector data. A conservation model and several variations of a Kalman filter model generated predicted queue lengths and wait times …

Assessing Augmented Reality Instruction In Manufacturing Engineering Education, Janine Draper Price

Theses and Dissertations

Augmented Reality (AR) is fast-growing technology that has proved itself in many applications, including manufacturing environments. Manufacturing engineers benefit in an industrial environment by harnessing this technology in the workplace to guide workers through a variety of tasks. It is no longer a question on whether it is useful, but what are the best ways of applying the technology. Currently there are no published studies on ways to use augmented reality in a Manufacturing Engineering Educational Environment (MEEE). This study examines various ways that AR can be used in an MEEE setting and assesses the value of such applications. This …

Research On Physical Layer Security Of Full-Duplex Uav Relaying, Shu Ye, Xiaodong Ji, Wenhua Li

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: Aiming at the physical layer security of a full-duplex UAV relaying system, a novel scheme based on the joint optimization of the transmit power and UAV flight trajectory is proposed. Under the condition of limited transmit power and flight trajectory, a joint optimization that maximizing the average secrecy rate of the system is constructed. The non-concave problem that cannot be solved directly is resolved into two sub-problems of transmit power and flight trajectory optimization, which can be transformed into the concave problem by the successive convex approximation method. An iterative algorithm is proposed to obtain the numerical solution of …

Western Michigan University Main Campus Parking Garage, Brendan Graham

Honors Theses

Student parking when attending class seems to be an issue at most universities. At Western Michigan University, it is a particular issue near the Haworth College of Business and Rood Hall. Students regularly struggle to find parking spaces in a timely manner when attending class in this area. Parking in this area currently consists solely of asphalt parking lots. It was our goal to both increase parking capacity and green space in this area. We will do this by designing a multi-level parking garage that will provide a more efficient use of parking space. As you will see later on, …

Carbon Nanotori Reinforced Lubricants In Plastic Deformation Processes, Jaime Taha-Tijerina, Juan Manuel Martinez, Daniel Euresti, Patsy Yessenia Arquieta-Guillen

Manufacturing & Industrial Engineering Faculty Publications

This research presents the effects of carbon nanotori structures (CNst) dispersed as reinforcement for metal-working and metal-forming lubricants. Synthetic (SL) and deep drawing (DD) nanolubricants were prepared following a two-step method at 0.01 wt.%, 0.05 wt.%, and 0.10 wt.% filler fractions. Slight increases in viscosity (oz) increased by 16% and 22% at merely 0.01 wt.% CNst reinforcement and up to 73% and 107% at 0.10 wt.% filler fraction for SL and DD nanolubricants, respectively, compared to conventional materials. Additionally, at 0.10 wt.% wear scar evaluations showed a highest benefit of 16% and 24%, for SL and DD nanolubricants, respectively. This …

Progression Of Marsh Edge Erosion: Quantification And Conceptualization Of Shoreline Mechanisms In Terrebonne Bay, La, Amina Meselhe

Honors Capstones

No abstract provided.

Fsae Vehicle Instrumentation And Validation, Alexander Anthony

Honors Theses

Formula SAE is a student chapter of the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE). Each year SAE hosts a collegiate competition for teams of university students to design, build, and compete with a formula-style vehicle. Students from all around the world collaborate to engineer and manufacture a competition worthy racecar. Each component of the vehicle is designed from scratch, using calculated load cases to optimize weight and strength. Once the car is built, students will test and validate their vehicle. Not every team has the opportunity to validate the critical load cases the vehicle is designed around. This senior design project …

2022- The Twenty-Sixth Annual Symposium Of Student Scholars

Symposium of Student Scholars Program Books

The full program book from the Twenty-sixth Annual Symposium of Student Scholars, held on April 19, 2022. Includes abstracts from the presentations and posters.

Antiviral Polymers: A Review, Ali Akbari, Ashkan Bigham, Vahid Rahimkhoei, Sina Sharifi, Esmaiel Jabbari

Faculty Publications

Polymers, due to their high molecular weight, tunable architecture, functionality, and buffering effect for endosomal escape, possess unique properties as a carrier or prophylactic agent in preventing pandemic outbreak of new viruses. Polymers are used as a carrier to reduce the minimum required dose, bioavailability, and therapeutic effectiveness of antiviral agents. Polymers are also used as multifunctional nanomaterials to, directly or indirectly, inhibit viral infections. Multifunctional polymers can interact directly with envelope glycoproteins on the viral surface to block fusion and entry of the virus in the host cell. Polymers can indirectly mobilize the immune system by activating macrophages and …

Second-Order Enhanced Coupling Strength Grating Out-Couplers For A Monolithic Laser-Electro-Absorption Modulator, Maryam Dezfuli

Electrical Engineering Theses and Dissertations

Conventional grating out-couplers in III-V waveguides typically require lengths of several hundreds of microns to outcouple 50 to 90% of the incident optical power. Enhanced coupling strength (ECS) gratings, which reduce the out-coupler grating length to tens of microns, have a large relative permittivity difference between the materials on either side of the grating boundary along with a high index cover layer. With appropriately chosen permittivity and layer thicknesses, the addition of a cover layer “pulls” the peak of the optical mode towards the grating region, resulting in a significant increase in the grating confinement factor. The resulting ECS out-coupler …

Development Of Synergistic Electrochemical Catalysis For Advancing Co2 Utilization, Naohiro Fujinuma

Theses and Dissertations

Electrochemical CO2 utilization is an attractive process for realizing carbon-neutral chemical production due to its electricity-driven ambient conditions, compatibility with renewable energy, and diversified products. This study aims to address unmet challenges hindering the wide adaptation of the process: (I) the absence of a highly selective and scalable catalyst for CO2 reduction reaction (CO2RR), (II) the large number of laborious experiments needed to optimize electrochemical materials/devices, and (III) the lack of an effective scheme for upgrading CO2-derived products. First, a bio-mimicking multi-component catalyst is explored, leading to the discovery of a highly selective Co-pyridine-derived catalyst for CO2RR into CO. The …

Analyzing Resource Allocation And Levelling In Construction Projects, Mohamed Eizeldin, Mohamed Hussein Hegazy, Ahmed Alhady, Shahir Ashraf

Civil Engineering

Project scheduling has been crucial in any construction project since applying poor scheduling may lead to cost overruns and delays. The most commonly used technique for scheduling is the critical path method (CPM). As CPM neglects the availability of resources and assumes only time as a constrain; therefore, the resource allocation problem (RAP) technique is introduced. RAP appears when the number of resources required exceeds the number of resources available. Moreover, as a result of solving the RAP, another problem will occur known as the resource leveling problem (RLP). RLP lead to lots of hiring and firing of laborers. Researchers …

Microscopic Nuclei Classification, Segmentation, And Detection With Improved Deep Convolutional Neural Networks (Dcnn), Md Zahangir Alom, Vijayan K. Asari, Anil Parwani, Tarek M. Taha

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Background Nuclei classification, segmentation, and detection from pathological images are challenging tasks due to cellular heterogeneity in the Whole Slide Images (WSI). Methods In this work, we propose advanced DCNN models for nuclei classification, segmentation, and detection tasks. The Densely Connected Neural Network (DCNN) and Densely Connected Recurrent Convolutional Network (DCRN) models are applied for the nuclei classification tasks. The Recurrent Residual U-Net (R2U-Net) and the R2UNet-based regression model named the University of Dayton Net (UD-Net) are applied for nuclei segmentation and detection tasks respectively. The experiments are conducted on publicly available datasets, including Routine Colon Cancer (RCC) classification and …

Optimal Operation For Park Integrated Energy System Considering Interruptible Loads, Lixin Ma, Ying Cheng

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: The operating mode of thermal power generation units has certain limitations in peak shaving capacity. Interruptible load (IL), as a power resource to be tapped, can be applied to the park integrated energy management and microgrid systems to guide users to reduce peak electricity consumption. The IL function is introduced into the park integrated energy system with combined heat and power units to improve the system's peak shaving ability, and the corresponding model is established with the optimization goal of economy. Taking an ecological park of northern region as the example, the adaptive chaotic particle swarm algorithm is used …

Radar Remote Sensing Data Augmentation Method Based On Generative Adversarial Network, Xu Kang, Xiaofeng Zhang

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: In the research field of radar remote sensing, both the completeness and diversity of radar data samples cannot meet the requirement of effective training of deep learning models, and the models are prone to over-fitting, which significantly limits the wide application of deep learning techniques in this field. Targeting on the needs of intelligent application in radar remote sensing, a microwave imaging radar suited data augmentation method is proposed to solve the issue of insufficient radar data samples by leveraging the general framework of generative adversarial network. Aiming at the features of radar samples being not obvious, the label …

A Devs-Based Formal Description Method For Complex Product Behavior Models, Qingquan Lin, Jiaran Yang, Heming Zhang

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: For the online optimization of pedestrian flow control in subway station, an algorithm frame for pedestrian flow control in subway station based on machine learning is designed. The pedestrian flow control process of a subway station during morning rush hour is selected,and the agent-based model is built to simulate the control process. The training data is collected through the multiple runs of the model, which is used as the input of deep reinforcement learning network, and the mature net is obtained through adequate training to provide the optimizing scheduling policy. Linking the actual data with the mature net …

Editorial For Gels 6th Anniversary Special Issue, Esmaiel Jabbari, Gulden Camci-Unal

Faculty Publications

Note: In lieu of an abstract, this is an excerpt from the first page.

This Special Issue celebrates many outstanding quality papers published in Gels over the past six years since its first issue was published in 2015 [...]

Prediction Of Springback In Aa6016-T4 Sheets Using Isotropic Finite Element And Epsc Modeling Approaches, Dane Roger Sargeant

Theses and Dissertations

Strain path changes are common in complex automotive stampings, where sheet materials undergo a combination of drawing, stretching, and bending to achieve a desired part shape. Aluminum sheet alloys are increasingly used in vehicle structure light-weighting efforts, but limited formability and high levels of springback present challenges to the manufacturing and assembly processes. The current work explores springback levels in AA6016-T4 sheet after various pure bending operations, where sheets were first pre-strained in uniaxial, plane-strain, and biaxial tension. Finite element modeling of the pre-straining and subsequent bending operations will be performed using both isotropic and elasto-plastic self-consistent (EPSC) crystal plasticity …

An Unmanned Swarm Search Method Based On Human-Robot Cooperation, Xin Zhou, Weiping Wang, Yifan Zhu, Tao Wang, Tian Jing

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: Human-robot collaboration is a research hotspot and the human and unmanned swarm collaborative search is a typical scenario. It can carry out the more complex tasks by combining the human complex reasoning capabilities with repeated and precise execution capabilities of unmanned swarm. Based on the high-value target search of the uncertain scenarios, the concept definition for the collaborative search of human and unmanned swarm is given. A multi-agent dynamic programming model under uncertain with unknown prior knowledge is proposed, established to describe how the multi-agent system carries out the search under human support. A dynamic programming algorithm …

Research On Space Launch Visualization Simulation Analysis Technology And Application, Feng Wu, Xiuluo Liu, Jia Wang, Yang Liu, Sujiang Li, Yan Zhong

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: Through the typical cases in the field of military, society, manufacturing etc., this paper introduces the concept and features of complex engineering system of systems as well as the significance of modeling and simulation for the study of complex engineering system of systems. Taking complex product manufacturing as an example, the evolution process from systems engineering to model-based systems engineering (MBSE) and then to modeling and simulation-based system of systems engineering is analyzed. The characteristics and challenges of modeling and simulation of complex engineering system of systems is discussed. Some research topics in filed of MSBS2E is introduced, which …

Hybrid Variable Neighborhood Search Algorithm For The Multi-Trip And Heterogeneous-Fleet Electric Vehicle Routing Problem, Weiquan Wang, Ding Ding, Shuyan Cao

Journal of System Simulation

Abstract: Based on the real business practice, the multi-trip and heterogeneous-fleet electric vehicle routing problem (MTHF-EVRP) with time windows in green logistics is studied. A path-based mixed-integer linear model is built for the precise solution to the small-scale instances. A hybrid variable neighborhood search algorithm (Hybrid VNS) combined the variable neighborhood search algorithm with the labeling algorithm is proposed for the large-scale instances. The algorithm generates a modified insertion heuristic with random factor to construct the initial solution, allows the time window and range violation, adopts the neighborhood operators for the local search, and applies a labeling algorithm to solve …