Engineering Commons^™

Detecting The Onion Routing Traffic In Real-Time By Using Reinforcement Learning, Dazhou Liu

Master's Theses

Anonymous networks have been popularly utilized to protect user anonymity and facilitate network security for a decade. However, such networks have been a platform for adversarial affairs and various network attacks including suspicious traffic generators. As a result, detecting anonymous network traffic is one critical task to defend a network against unpredictable attacks. Many new methods using machine learning and deep learning techniques have been proposed. However, many of them rely heavily on a vast amount of labeled data and have complicated architectures. Since network traffic always fluctuates under different network environments, those techniques may degrade in performance due to …

Intrinsic Motivation By The Principles Of Non-Linear Dynamical Systems, Phu C. Nguyen

Master's Theses

The design of appropriate control rules for the stabilization of dynamical systems can require quite substantial domain knowledge. Modern AI methodologies, such as Reinforcement Learning, are often used to mitigate the need for such knowledge. However, these can be slow and often rely on at least some hand-designed reward structure, and thus human input, to be more effective. Here, we propose an alternative route to construct rewards requiring only minimal domain knowledge, essentially relying on the structure of the dynamical system itself. For this, we use truncated Lyapunov exponents as rewards to calculate the stabilizing controller from samples. Concretely, the …

Interdependence Of Salt Concentration And Filler Particles On Crystallinity And Mechanical Behavior Of Peo-Litfsi Electrolytes For Lithium-Ion Batteries, Valeria Perez

Master's Theses

Developing composite polymer electrolytes is crucial for enhancing the safety, energy density, and performance of lithium-ion batteries. While it is widely accepted that introducing filler particles in PEO-based electrolytes can reduce crystallinity and enhance ionic conductivity, this conventional understanding applies primarily to electrolytes with high lithium salt concentrations. The hypothesis of this investigation is that the crystallinity change induced by LLZTO ceramic particles in PEO-LiTFSI electrolytes is contingent on the EO:Li molar ratio. This hypothesis is interrogated by measuring changes in crystallinity, spherulite morphology, and stiffness of composite polymer electrolytes with two different EO:Li molar ratios using differential scanning calorimetry, …

Controllability-Constrained Deep Neural Network Models For Enhanced Control Of Dynamical Systems, Suruchi Sharma

Master's Theses

Control of a dynamical system without the knowledge of dynamics is an important and challenging task. Modern machine learning approaches, such as deep neural networks (DNNs), allow for the estimation of a dynamics model from control inputs and corresponding state observation outputs. Such data-driven models are often utilized for the derivation of model-based controllers. However, in general, there are no guarantees that a model represented by DNNs will be controllable according to the formal control-theoretical meaning of controllability, which is crucial for the design of effective controllers. This often precludes the use of DNN-estimated models in applications, where formal controllability …

Micro-Scale Laser-Induced Fluorescence Thermometry For Multiphase Flow In Porous Media, Samuel J. Simmons

Master's Theses

In this thesis the use of Laser-Induced Fluorescence (LIF) thermometry was evaluated as a temperature measurement for multiphase flow in porous media. This optical temperature measurement technique utilizes the temperature-dependent emissive properties of fluorescent dyes to measure temperature. This research evaluates the accuracy, spatial resolution, and temporal resolution of LIF thermometry compared to existing temperature measurements. In this research water-soluble and oil-soluble fluorescent dyes are evaluated in terms of their temperature sensitivity. The ability of these dyes to measure temperature is compared to an Ansys FEA simulation of a fixed temperature gradient. For multiphase flow, the fluorescent dyes were both …

Differential Gene Expression Analysis Of Rodent Mammary Tissue Reveals Dysregulation Of Greb1 And An Age-Dependent Response To Spaceflight, Cleoma Arnold

Master's Projects

Life aboard spacecraft poses a danger to astronaut health, with hazards including microgravity, radiation, and enclosed spaces. Research into mitigating these health issues includes analysis of the transcriptome of rodents sent to the International Space Station. This project investigates the effects of spaceflight on the mammary tissue of female mice of two age groups, 10-12 and 32 weeks, in order to assess the impact of age and spaceflight on gene expression in a tissue relevant to female health. Analysis of the OSD-511 dataset from NASA’s Open Science Data Repository utilized a containerized implementation of their RNA-Seq pipeline on the San …

Image-Based Malware Detection Using Convolutional Neural Network Techniques, Brandon Palomino

Master's Projects

In this study, we delve into the realm of malware detection and classification, leveraging the capabilities of different Convolutional Neural Networks (CNNs). Our approach involves transforming executable files into image formats and subsequently applying advanced CNN techniques for image recognition. The study emphasizes the use of two distinct CNN architectures: a traditional CNN model and a modified CNN variant known as a convolutional recurrent neural network (CRNN), each with unique structural and functional attributes. To effectively train these models, we adopt a transfer learning strategy, utilizing pre-existing CNN models that have been extensively trained on large-scale image datasets. This methodology …

Estimating Air Pollution Levels Using Machine Learning, Srujay Rao Devaraneni

Master's Projects

Air pollution has emerged as a substantial concern, especially in developing countries worldwide. An important aspect of this issue is the presence of PM2.5. Air pollutants with a diameter of 2.5 or less micrometers are known as PM2.5. Due to their size, these particles are a serious health risk and can quickly infiltrate the lungs, leading to a variety of health problems. Due to growing concerns about air pollution, technology like automatic air quality measurement can offer beneficial assistance for both personal and business decisions. This research suggests an ensemble machine learning model that can efficiently replace the standard air …

Boosting Snr Of Cascaded Fbgs In A Sapphire Fiber Through A Rapid Heat Treatment, Farhan Mumtaz, Hanok Tekle, Bohong Zhang, Jeffrey D. Smith, Ronald J. O'Malley, Rex Gerald, Jie Huang

PSMRC Faculty Research

This Letter reports the performance of femtosecond (fs) laser-written distributed fiber Bragg gratings (FBGs) under high-temperature conditions up to 1600°C and explores the impact of rapid heat treatment on signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) enhancement. FBGs are essential for reliable optical sensing in extreme temperature environments. Comprehensive tests demonstrate the remarkable performance and resilience of FBGs at temperatures up to 1600°C, confirming their suitability for deployment in such conditions. The study also reveals significant fringe visibility improvements of up to ∼10 dB on a 1-m-long sapphire optical fiber through rapid heat treatment, representing a first-time achievement to the best of our knowledge. …

Electron Beam Treatment For The Removal Of 1,4-Dioxane In Water And Wastewater, Robert Pearce, Xi Li, John Vennekate, Gianluigi Ciovati, Charles Bott

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

Electron beam (e-beam) treatment uses accelerated electrons to form oxidizing and reducing radicals when applied to water without the use of external chemicals. In this study, electron beam treatment was used to degrade 1,4-dioxane in several water matrices. Removal improved in the progressively cleaner water matrices and removals as high as 94% to 99% were observed at a dose of 2.3 kGy in secondary effluent. 1,4-dioxane removal was confirmed to be primarily through hydroxyl radical oxidation. The calculated electrical energy per order was found to be 0.53, 0.26, and 0.08 kWh/m³/order for secondary effluent (Avg. total organic carbon …

Optimizing Human Performance To Enhance Safety: A Case Study In An Automotive Plant, Maria Chiara Leva, Michaela Demichela, Carlos Albarran Morillo, Franco Modaffari, Lorenzo Comberti

Articles

Human factors play a relevant role in the dynamic work environments of the manufacturing sector in terms of production efficiency, safety, and sustainable performance. This is particularly relevant in assembly lines where humans are widely employed alongside automated and robotic agents. In this situation, operators’ ability to adapt to different levels of task complexity and variability in each workstation has a strong impact on the safety, reliability, and efficiency of the overall production process. This paper presents an application of a theoretical and empirical method used to assess the matching of different workers to various workstations based on a quantified …

Enhancing Control Room Operator Decision Making: An Application Of Dynamic Influence Diagrams In Formaldehyde Manufacturing, Joseph Mietkiewicz, Anders L. Madsen

Articles

Intoday’s rapidly evolving industrial landscape, control room operators must grapple with an ever-growing array of tasks and respon sibilities. One major challenge facing these operators is the potential for task overload, which can lead to decision fatigue and increased reliance on cognitive biases. To address this issue, we propose the use of dynamic influence diagrams (DID) as the core of our decision support system. By monitoring the process over time and identifying anomalies, DIDs can recommend the most effective course of action based on a probabilistic assessment of future outcomes. Instead of letting the operator choose or search for the …

Cfd Simulation Of Anaerobic Granular Sludge Reactors: A Review, Camila D' Bastiani, David Kennedy, Anthony Reynolds

Articles

Anaerobic digestion processes can generate renewable energy in the form of biogas while treating organic wastewater. The generation of biogas within anaerobic digestion systems is directly linked to the mixing conditions inside the reactors. In high-rate reactors such as the up-flow anaerobic sludge blanket (UASB) reactor, the expanded granular sludge bed (EGSB) reactor and the internal circulation (IC) reactor, the hydrodynamic behaviour will depend on the interactions between the wastewater, the biogas, and the biomass granules. Over the past few years, various researchers have used computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to study the hydrodynamic behaviour in these types of reactors. This …

Forecasting Energy Consumption Demand Of Customers In Smart Grid Using Temporal Fusion Transformer (Tft), Amril Nazir, Abdul Khalique Shaikh, Abdul Salam Shah, Ashraf Khalil

All Works

Energy consumption prediction has always remained a concern for researchers because of the rapid growth of the human population and customers joining smart grids network for smart home facilities. Recently, the spread of COVID-19 has dramatically increased energy consumption in the residential sector. Hence, it is essential to produce energy per the residential customers' requirements, improve economic efficiency, and reduce production costs. The previously published papers in the literature have considered the overall energy consumption prediction, making it difficult for production companies to produce energy per customers' future demand. Using the proposed study, production companies can accurately have energy per …

Fem Eem Dataset: Optimising Retrofitted Insulation For Irish Residential Building Walls, Rakshit D. Muddu, Aimee Byrne, Anthony Robinson Dr.

Datasets

A large number of combinations of Irish wall types, insulation materials, and heating fuel types were produced to compare the multiple variables which influence Optimal Insulation Thickness values. The total cost (TC) and carbon emission (CE) at optimum insulation thickness (OIT) for all combinations of insulation material and three types of fuel are considered. The dataset presents OIT for solid wall, cavity wall and cavity block wall types located in Monaghan, Dublin, and Kerry.

Synthetic Heart Sound Dataset, Davoud Shariat Panah, Andrew Hines, Susan Mckeever

Datasets

The repository contains synthetic heart sound recordings. The publication related to this dataset is "Exploring the impact of noise and degradations on heart sound classification models", Biomedical Signal Processing and Control journal.

Airport Ground Access Choice Between Transportation Network Companies And Parking: A Case Study Of Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, Sen Wang, Yichen Zheng, Yi Gao

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

The segment between home and airports is an essential component in all air transportation trips. Travelers normally have different ground access options to commence their journeys. Using Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport as a special case, this study proposes a theoretical framework for quantifying and comparing the overall cost of driving and parking at airport and the use of Transportation Network Companies (TNCs) ridesharing services such as Uber. Based on the cost comparison, we design an interactive web application to visualize the utility advantage area and summarize the corresponding demographic information. Our study has the potential to benefit airports, TNC operators, …

Women And Minorities In Commercial Aviation: A Quantitative Analysis Of Data From The United States Bureau Of Labor Statistics, Robert Fowler Jr, Alexandria Lundberg, Daniel Siao, Carlos Smith

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

The number of women and minorities working in aviation occupations has been very low and continues to be very low according to data from the United States Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). Occupations in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) include aircraft pilots, flight engineers, aircraft mechanics and service technicians. Although the ratio of women and minorities working in these occupations remains low, data from the BLS indicates that the total number of individuals from these underrepresented groups who work in these occupations has increased in the last 2 decades. This research focuses on BLS data to determine employment trends …

Learning From Past In The Commercial Air Transport Industry: A Bibliometric Analysis And Systematic Literature Review In The Safety Management Framework, Alok Tyagi, Rajesh Tripathi Dr, Soufiane Bouarfa Dr

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

In the commercial air transport industry, numerous accidents have occurred because stakeholders have failed to learn lessons from the past. The reactive hazard identification (HI) methodology in the current regulatory safety management framework provides a fresh opportunity to negotiate the challenges of the air transportation sector's predicted growth and societal safety expectations. In the regulatory framework, ‘learning from the past’ is related to the reactive method of HI, and it is viewed as a data-driven decision-making process in this review. This literature review aims to investigate academic literature on ‘learning from the past’ in the aviation industry to comprehend an …

Elastoplastic Quasi-Static And Impact Load Response Of Steel Structure Sub-Assemblage With Cfrp Strips, Ali Al Aloosi, Zia Razzaq

Civil & Environmental Engineering Faculty Publications

Presented in this paper is the outcome of an experimental investigation of the elastoplastic quasi-static and impact load response of a steel sub-assemblage constructed using a pair of hollow square section members with or without Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymer (CFRP) strips. The sub-assemblage consists of a long structural member welded to a short member, thus representing a typical combination of a column and a beam on the face of a multi-story steel building frame. The column is subjected to a lateral quasi-static or impact load. Tests are conducted on four separate steel sub-assemblages. The first two tests are conducted with …

The Effects Of Dental Hygiene Instrument Handles On Muscle Activity Production, Jessica R. Suedbeck, Daniel Russell, Cortney Armitano Lago, Emily A. Ludwig

Dental Hygiene Faculty Publications

Purpose The objective of this study was to compare the effects of ten commercially available instrument handle designs’ mass and diameter on forearm muscle activity during a simulated periodontal scaling experience.

Methods A convenience sample of 25 registered dental hygienists were recruited for this IRB-approved study. Ten commercially available instruments were categorized into four groups based on their masses and diameters: large diameter/light mass, small diameter/light mass, large diameter/heavy mass, and small diameter/heavy mass. Participants were randomized to four instruments with one from each group. Participants scaled with each instrument in a simulated oral environment while muscle activity was collected …

Probabilistic Invariance For Gaussian Process State Space Models, Paul Griffioen, Alex Devonport, Murat Arcak

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

Gaussian process state space models are becoming common tools for the analysis and design of nonlinear systems with uncertain dynamics. When designing control policies for these systems, safety is an important property to consider. In this paper, we provide safety guarantees for Gaussian process state space models in the form of probabilistic invariant sets, where the state trajectory is guaranteed to lie within an invariant set for all time with a particular probability. We provide a sufficient condition in the form of a linear matrix inequality to evaluate the probabilistic invariance of the system, and we demonstrate our contributions with …

A Synthesized Dual-Polarized Planar Slotted Antenna Array For Sar Sensors, Ahmed E. Gohar, Haythem H. Abdullah, Mohy El Din Abo El-Soud

Mansoura Engineering Journal

A synthetic aperture radar (SAR) sensor antenna is the main concern in this research work. The antenna specifications are settled according to the link budget of a project funded by the Egyptian Space Agency. The antenna should achieve a 30 dBi gain and an SLL of less than -27 dB with a low-profile and simple structure. The proposed antenna is an array of 16 x 18 planar elements that based on microstrip technology. The 16 x 18 antenna array consists of 16 linear antenna arrays of 18 elements each. Each element of the antenna array has two orthogonal slots with …

Effects Of Power Stations Emissions On Air Quality In Kuwait, Abdullah F.M. Al-Rukaibi, I. G. Rashed, M.M. El-Halwany, O. Hamed

Mansoura Engineering Journal

The research describes the Gaussian plume model used to estimate the concentration of pollutants emitted from power plants and dispersed in the atmosphere. The object of the research is to compare the air quality between areas which is near to source station and away from the source station. The research estimates the concentrations of pollutants released from six electric power stations in Kuwait using the Gaussian plume model. A power plant with a stack height of 100 m, stack diameter of 2 m, and an emission rate of 1 kg/s for each station is considered. The Pasquill-Gifford stability categories are …

Design And Analysis Of Advanced Low Power Consumption Hybrid Switch With Experimental Verification, A. Hussein, M. Abd-Elazzem, M. Abo-Elsoud, Mahmoud M. Saafan

Mansoura Engineering Journal

This paper presents a hardware implementation for a hybrid switch (HS) that can be used successfully as a fast switch in industrial power factor correction (PFC) panels and for electrical transformers. The main components of HS are a semiconductor switch as Silicon Controlled Rectifier (SCR) or thyristor and a mechanical switch as a relay. In the conventional PFC solution, the correction process is based on traditional electromagnetic contactors so, a huge current will appear during the turn-on operation In addition there is frequently a spark. Due to the parallel technique between SCR and latched relay, the proposed HS can inhibit …

Comparison Between Different Codes In Design Cold-Formed Steel Lipped Channel Section Subjected To Axial Load Or Bending Moment, Samar El-Sayed Ibrahim Atya, Ahmed Hussain Ali Abdelrahman, Fikry Abdo Salem, Nabil Sayed Mahmoud, Mohamed Ghannam

Mansoura Engineering Journal

This paper presents a comparative analysis between Eurocode3 (EC3), the North American Specification (AISI), and the Egyptian Code of Practice (ECP-205) to design Cold-Formed Steel (CFS) compression and flexural members with channel profiles. The research recognizes similarities and variations in strength measures to facilitate the learning process in the design codes, as well as the expressions and limits provided in the ECP, EC3, and AISI design codes. A computer program was designed to improve the speed of the calculation process. The software was created utilizing the C+ programming language and was programmed to calculate the axial load and bending moment …

A Relativistic Geodetic Approach To Unify The Height System For Africa, Mostafa Ashry, Wen-Bin Shen, Abdelrahim Ruby, Zhang Pengfei, Ziyu Shen, Hussein A. Abd-Elmotaal, Mostafa Abd-Elbaky, Atef A. Makhloof

Mansoura Engineering Journal

This study focuses on the establishment of a unified height system for Africa called AFRUHS (African Unified Height System) by utilizing atomic 8 clocks and clock networks. The International Association of Geodesy (IAG) has 9 long aims to construct an International Height Reference Frame (IHRF), but the lack of accurate and globally harmonized vertical coordinates, particularly in Africa, has posed a challenge. To overcome this, the researchers propose using clock networks to determine geopotential or elevation differences between distant stations by measuring the gravitational redshift (GR) through clock frequency comparisons. The research employs simulation studies using the ACES (Atomic Clock …

Indoor Pedestrian Navigation Using Pdr/Wi-Fi Integration, Ahmad Yhaya, Ehab H. Abdelhay, Mohammed A. H. Abozied, Ahmed Shaaban Samra

Mansoura Engineering Journal

Positioning of pedestrians is a challenging problem. Especially, in case of global positioning system (GPS) signal outage inside buildings. The inertial navigation system (INS) systems are always used to detect the motion of the human body by placing inertial measurement unit (IMU) in a specific part of the human body. However, using IMU alone will not produce proper navigation solution with sufficient accuracy due to gradually accumulated errors of IMU stochastic drift, noise, and state integration with time. Which lead the recent researchers to enhance the performance of indoor navigation systems using aiding sources such as received signal strength (RSS) …

Modular Pandemic Hospitals: A Challenge For Living, Mona Y. Shedid, Eman M. O. Mokhtar

Mansoura Engineering Journal

Over the last several months, the COVID-19 pandemic has globally affected millions of humans and has changed every aspect of our daily life. Hospitals play a major role to combat this pandemic disease however; they are struggling as they are confronted with sudden influx of patients and are jammed to capacity with a lack of available beds and treatment spaces. In managing this health crisis, a rapid resolution concerning our perception and future hospital designs needs to change to save as many lives as possible. According to a pilot study with experts in architecture, four problems during the design of …

Usage Of Virtual Reality Techniques In Revival Of Heritage Religious Buildings (Study Examples From The Unesco Tentative List In Egypt), Reham Ezzat Elsayad, Medhat A. Samra

Mansoura Engineering Journal

The research focuses on the architectural documentation of religious buildings with architectural value and the role of this process in reviving heritage values. Every architectural detail had told us a story which is collected as the identity of the city. The fragility of these buildings and their artifacts, natural disasters, climate change, visitors' impact and lack of information usually leads to the inaccessibility of these buildings. But, due to the historical and touristic value of the religious buildings, the documentation process become necessary to benefit both visitors and researchers by availability and ease of access to information.

The traditional documentation …