Engineering Commons^™

Development And Evaluation Of Muon Scattering Tomography Reconstruction Techniques For Spent Fuel Verification, Jesus J. Valencia

Nuclear Engineering ETDs

The International Atomic Energy Agency has acknowledged the need to “efficiently verify and maintain knowledge of spent fuel in shielding/storage/transport containers at all points in their life cycle”. Cosmic-ray muon scattering tomography has shown potential to create reconstruction images of dry cask contents that would be useful for in-situ verification of spent fuel within dry casks.

In this document, several muon scattering tomography reconstruction techniques are explored using experimental track data through a partially filled dry cask container and steel drum test object. Two three-dimensional reconstruction techniques, a backprojection and newly developed combined depth of field algorithm, are evaluated. The …

Mosaic Swarm Robotics: Emulating Natural Collective Behaviors For Efficient Task Execution With Custom Mobile Robots, Jonathan Ridley, Arielle Charles, Charles Koduru, Muhammad Hassan Tanveer, Razvan Voicu

Symposium of Student Scholars

Mosaics, as an artistic expression, involves the meticulous arrangement of diverse tiles to form a unified composition. Drawing inspiration from this concept, the field of swarm robotics seeks to emulate nature’s collective behaviors observed in ant colonies, fish schools, and bird flocks, employing multiple agents to accomplish tasks efficiently. Our research explores the concept of mosaic swarm robotics, where numerous nodes with specialized functions are deployed across various domains, including applications for outdoor data capture and environment mapping. We utilized custom mobile robots operated by Raspberry Pi microcontrollers. By establishing an elaborate web of client-to-client communications to enable true localized …

Meadowminds: An Ai Literacy Game, Michelle Yavorskiy, Lydia Kim

Computer Science and Engineering Senior Theses

The emergence of artificial intelligence (AI) in our everyday lives has created a need for educating young people of the fundamentals and capabilities of AI in an engaging and effective manner. "MeadowMinds: An AI Literacy Game" aims to address this need by creating a game that simplifies complex machine learning (ML) concepts into an accessible 3D world for middle school students. This project follows a structured, agile development approach, incorporating comprehensive user research and feedback. The objectives of this project included transforming ML concepts, such as clustering and embedding in Large Language Models (LLMs), into interactive gameplay. We utilized various …

Development Of An Experimentally Validated Computational Fluid Dynamics Model For A Pbi Membrane-Based Anhydrous Hcl Electrolyzer, Kris Likit-Anurak, Hunter R. Teel, Ishwor Karki, Ben I. Howard, Brian C. Benicewicz, Sirivatch Shimpalee, Benjamin H. Meekins

Faculty Publications

We report the development of an experimentally-validated computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model for simulation of an anhydrous HCl electrolyzer. The experimental data from 3 membrane variants was used to provide kinetic and membrane parameters for the model. The model not only accurately simulates overall electrolyzer performance, but it also provides key insights into the transport phenomena within the electrolyzer. The model allows simulation of experimental parameters like high HCl flowrates and increased cell pressure that pose a high safety risk to researchers. The model shows hotspots in the temperature distribution that will need to be addressed by flow field modification …

Ensuring Resilience Against Stealthy Attacks On Cyber-Physical Systems, Paul Griffioen, Bruce H. Krogh, Bruno Sinopoli

Faculty Work Comprehensive List

This article provides a tool for analyzing mechanisms that aim to achieve resilience against stealthy, or undetectable, attacks on cyber-physical systems. We consider attackers who are able to corrupt all of the inputs and outputs of the system. To counter such attackers, a response scheme must be implemented that keeps the attacker from corrupting the inputs and outputs of the system for certain periods of time. To aid in the design of such a response scheme, our tool provides sufficient lengths for these periods of time in order to ensure safety with a particular probability. We provide an upper bound …

Demand Response And Peer-To-Peer Energy Trading For Residential Microgrid, Kanakadhurga D

Theses and Dissertations

Demand Side Management (DSM) is vital in handling uncertain renewable power generation and demand in a deregulated power system. The flat load profile can be obtained using the Demand Response (DR) techniques with the storage elements and proper switching. The increasing penetration of renewable-based distributed generation (DGs), batteries, and electric vehicles (EVs) supports the DR measures that facilitate utility and consumer.

This research aims to minimize the peak demand, electricity cost, and emission rate by effectively utilizing the storage with Renewable Energy Sources (RES). The first specific aim of the research objective focuses on the impact of DR implementation, DGs …

Scalability And Connectivity Challenges For The Future Of Digital Radio Communication, Christopher Bayliss

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

This thesis explores future challenges in digital radio communication, particularly focusing on scalability and connectivity issues that could impede technological advancements. With the increasing production of digital technology and reliance on radio frequencies, there is a need for innovative solutions to overcome limitations in spectrum availability, interference management, and bandwidth constraints. This work evaluates current modulation techniques, spectrum allocation strategies, and advanced communication technologies such as cognitive radio systems and reconfigurable intelligent surfaces. Through a comprehensive literature review and analysis, this thesis identifies promising developments, including dynamic spectrum sharing and symbiotic radio systems, that could significantly enhance spectrum efficiency and …

Coupling Treatment Technologies With Bioelectrochemical Systems To Optimize Resource Recovery From Wastewater, Matthew Stephen Ferby

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

Wastewater is a common waste produced from municipal, agricultural, and industrial processes. As the world’s population increases, the amount of wastewater produced globally is expected to reach approximately 450 billion m3 in the next two decades. Issues surrounding water, food, and energy accessibility will also become more imminent as the population grows. Interestingly, wastewater is an unconventional source of resources including water, nutrients (e.g., NH4+ and PO43-), and energy. However, conventional wastewater treatment processes focus primarily on the removal of containments rather than the recovery of resources. Bioelectrochemical systems (BES) have the ability to recover resources from wastewater. These engineered …

Development Of Grid-Forming And Grid-Following Inverter Control In Microgrid Network Ensuring Grid Stability And Frequency Response, V. Vignesh Babu, J. Preetha Roselyn, C. Nithya, Prabha Sundaravadivel

Electrical Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

This paper proposes a control strategy for grid-following inverter control and grid-forming inverter control developed for a Solar Photovoltaic (PV)–battery-integrated microgrid network. A grid-following (GFL) inverter with real and reactive power control in a solar PV-fed system is developed; it uses a Phase Lock Loop (PLL) to track the phase angle of the voltages at the PCC and adopts a vector control strategy to adjust the active and reactive currents that are injected into the power grid. The drawback of a GFL inverter is that it lacks the capability to operate independently when the utility grid is down due to …

Data-Driven Evaluation Of Deep Generative Models In Biomedical Imaging, Rucha Milind Deshpande

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

Deep generative models (DGMs) have tremendous potential for several biomedical imaging applications such as data augmentation, image reconstruction, and image denoising. However, the deployment of DGMs in real-world biomedical imaging workflows without domain-relevant evaluations can jeopardize patient health and well-being. The evaluation of DGMs in biomedical imaging is challenging due to several factors: requirement of domain expertise for visual inspection, lack of a mathematically defined ground truth, and the unclear relevance of popular evaluation measures adopted from the computer vision literature. Given these challenges, one way to evaluate DGMs is via purposefully designed synthetic data. In this thesis, two frameworks …

Improving And Modeling Heterogeneous Streaming Computation, Clayton Faber

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

Data streaming algorithms are a class of problems that deal with moving data through a system while being processed. When implementing these types of algorithms a developer will spend time tuning an implementation for deployment, but if they are using heterogeneous architectures or when nodes of computation are physically separate from one another performance may be lost to unforeseen data movement complications. In this work we aim to alleviate some of these pain points through a combination of programming advice and mathematical models. One of the pain points often unseen and underappreciated by developers is a type of data streaming …

Air Quality Assessment On Local And Hyperlocal Scales, Zhiyao Li

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

Air quality monitoring across local and hyperlocal scales has attracted increased attention from both the public and research community. There are several approaches such as passive samplers and low-cost air quality sensors, depending on the pollutant and measurement objectives. Local and hyperlocal air pollutant measurements help to characterize local emission sources such as traffic and industry, including separating these signals from large scale influences (e.g., urban and regional scales), and better understand how land use types and meteorology influence pollutant spatiotemporal patterns. Low-cost sensors (LCS) are now a popular approach to monitor several criteria pollutants (e.g., particulate matter (PM), ozone, …

Exploring Applications Of Artificial Intelligence In Water And Wastewater Management Systems, Yanran Xu

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

Water and wastewater management systems play an essential role in satisfying residential, commercial, and industrial needs, but these systems suffer from undesired issues and high expenses, which stresses the need for sustainable development and system optimization. Modeling simulation is commonly used to optimize system performance through process prediction and precise control, and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies including machine learning (ML) and deep learning (DL) are showing their advantages in the application of water and wastewater management systems. A general framework was illustrated for optimized performance and enhanced explainability of ML models. Several analytical techniques were explored, including feature engineering, data …

Structural Dynamics Of The Human Brain In Vivo From Tagged Mri And Mr Elastography, Jordan De Niro Escarcega

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

The underlying mechanics surrounding vulnerability of human brains in response to impact is critical to our ability to diagnose and treat traumatic brain injury (TBI), but our understanding of brain mechanical behavior is incomplete. Tagged MRI (tMRI) and magnetic resonance elastography (MRE) are two imaging techniques that are used to visualize and quantify deformation fields in human brains in vivo. The objective of this thesis is to gain a better understanding of brain vulnerability, by quantitively analyzing deformation fields extracted from in vivo human imaging studies. This was achieved through the following aims: (1) Extract mode shapes and natural frequencies …

Development, Numerical Simulation And Turbulence Modeling Of A Sustainable Transonic Truss-Braced Wing Aircraft Using Liquid Hydrogen Fuel And Active Flow Control, Bryce Zachary Thomas

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

There is pressing need for emissions reduction and an increase in efficiency for the next generation of commercial aircraft in order to reduce the environmental impact of the aviation sector and combat global climate change. The implementation of alternative fuels as well as new engine and wing designs are actively being explored as methods to reduce emissions. This thesis analyzes the implementation of hydrogen fuel, a transonic truss braced wing and active flow controls as means to improve the performance of a medium range commercial airliner. The widespread adoption of cryogenic liquid hydrogen (LH2) fuel as a green alternative to …

Application Of Finite-State Wake Models To Rotors Re-Entering Their Own Wake, Michael Seay Morrow

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

This paper details the development of a finite-state, dynamic wake model for the purpose of modeling a helicopter rotor reentering its own wake. This model stems directly from both the Peters-Morillo wake model to determine the velocity field on and above the helicopter rotor and the Peters-Fei model to compute the velocity field below the rotor. The specific case of nonzero net thrust was evaluated under assumptions of axial flow and potential flow theory. Results consist of computations of the inflow velocity for this case, along with comparison to closed-form, potential flow solutions for validation. The finite-state model is shown …

Longitudinal Spatial Trends In U.S. Pedestrian And Bicyclist Fatalities, Ossiris Rodriguez, Nicholas N. Ferenchak

Civil Engineering ETDs

Between 2009 and 2022 in the United States (U.S.), pedestrian fatalities increased 82.3% and bicyclist fatalities increased 70.8%. Several studies have researched crash characteristics such as the people and roadways involved in these crashes. But where are these fatalities occurring within our regions and what spatial characteristics of these locations could be influencing this trend? We analyzed pedestrian and bicyclist fatality data from the last two decades using NHTSA’s Fatality Analysis Reporting System (FARS) in relation to built-environment and socio-economic characteristics (such as street network density, transit access, poverty, and educational attainment) obtained from the U.S. Census and the U.S. …

Aerospace Vehicle Comprising Module For Method Of Terrain, Terrain Activity And Material Classification, Matthew E. Nussbaum, Marissa S. Herron

AFIT Patents

A method of classifying terrain, terrain activity and materials through panchromatic imagery a module programmed to provide such classification and aerospace vehicles comprising such module is provided. Panchromatic images of known materials terrains and terrain activities are taken and processed to form a multiband texture cube, that due it amount of data, is stored as a computer data base. New panchromatic images of unclassified materials, terrains and/or terrain activities are processed and compared via computer with such database that allows for inexpensive, quick and efficient classification of such new images.

Evaluating The Health Benefits And Cost-Effectiveness Of Dental Sealant Reapplication Among Children And Adolescents, Pritam Deb, Jayden Ayash, Christina Scherrer

Symposium of Student Scholars

Dental caries, commonly known as cavities, persist as a prevalent chronic disease among children. Dental sealants, which are transparent coatings applied to the molars, have been proven to prevent over 80% of caries in these teeth. However, the effectiveness of sealants diminishes over time, primarily due to their potential to detach shortly after application due to inadequate bonding, or else gradually over time. Notably, dental insurance coverage for resealing teeth after the initial sealant has been lost varies widely, with many policies only covering the cost of the initial application. This study employs a Markov model-based discrete event simulation to …

Influence Of Al2o3 Passivation Layer Thickness On The Thermal Stability And Quality Of Mocvd-Grown Gan On Si, S M Atiqur Rahman, Manika Tun Nafisa, Zhe Chuan Feng, Benjamin Klein, Ian T. Ferguson

Symposium of Student Scholars

This research delves into the significant impact of varying thicknesses of the Al₂O₃ passivation layer on the thermal stability and crystalline quality of GaN on Si structures, an essential aspect for the next generation of high-temperature electronic and optoelectronic devices. By adopting metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) for the growth process, we analyzed structures with different Al₂O₃ passivation layer thicknesses: none, 2 nm, 10 nm, and 20 nm, each built upon the GaN layer. Through Raman spectroscopy, we meticulously assessed the changes in the E₂ (High) phonon mode's peak position and full width …

Early Age Assessment Of A New Course Of Irish Fly Ash As A Cement Replacement, Niall Holmes Dr., Nikki Shaji, Mark Tyrer

Articles

This paper explores the potential of a new source of fly ash, deposited on the site of a coalfired power plant in Ireland dating from 1985 to 1995, as a cement replacement material. A series of X-ray diffraction (XRD) analyses on binder samples with cement replacement levels of 0, 10, 25 and 35% was undertaken to determine the fly ash’s mineralogical composition and to determine its suitability as a supplemental cementitious material (SCM). The XRD results reveal a unique mineral composition with promising characteristics for enhancing the strength and durability of concrete. The experimental results were used to calibrate a …

Effects Of Ti Addition On The Characteristics Of Al-10zn-6mg-2si/Zro2 Composites Produced By Squeeze Casting, Qesha Diva Prameshvara, Pipin Indah Lestari, Bondan Tiara Sofyan

Journal of Materials Exploration and Findings

Metal matrix composite (MMC) with 7xxx aluminum matrix is potential for ballistic applications due to the combination of strength, toughness, and light weight. Previous study successfully produced aluminum-based composites with SiC particles which were able to stop type III bullet, however cracks remained on back of the plate. Therefore, in this research, SiC was replaced by zirconia (ZrO₂) due to its high fracture toughness. Ti-B grain refiner was added to further improve toughness through grain boundary strengthening mechanism. This research developed 5 vol.% ZrO₂ strengthened Al-10Zn-6Mg-2Si composite with addition of Al-5Ti-1B grain refiner produced through squeeze casting …

Integration Of The Ashby Technique And Pahl-Beitz Quantitative Ranking For Railway Axle Material Selection, Helya Chafshoh Nafisah, Jaka Fajar Fatriansyah, Siti Norasmah Surip

Journal of Materials Exploration and Findings

Railway axle serves as a vital connection between the train's wheels and its body. However, cyclic loading and high speed can induce fatigue in railway axle, which potentially leads to damage human safety. Therefore, it is important to find materials that have good mechanical properties with the lowest weight and cost. In this paper, a comprehensive method using Ashby chart has been performed to select candidate materials of railway axle. The methods begin with analyzing function by determining the problem, objective function, and constraints. After that, the results obtained are ranked using Pahl and Beitz quantitative weighting method. The results …

Study On Human Integrity Management System Maturity Level For Supporting Asset Integrity And Process Safety Implementation, Anggiat M. Sihotang, Dedi Priadi, D. Rizal Asral

Journal of Materials Exploration and Findings

The human factors (HF) are recognized as one of critical process safety barriers involved in normal and abnormal conditions in the oil and gas industry. In order to strengthen the HF roles as barriers we need to ensure that the actions generated are based on a valid risk assessment of the operation to be addressed by a relevant human factor analysis. Organizations within the oil and gas process have made much progress in understanding and implementing HF improvement programs. However, organizations are not always clear about what are their current situations in managing HF, their priorities for HF to be …

Analysis Of The Effect Of Different Surface Preparation Methods On Corrosion Resistance And Adhesion Strength Of Astm A36 Steel Substrate With Surface Tolerant Epoxy Paint As Coating Material, Irwan Wijaya Santoso, Daffa Aqila, Rini Riastuti, Rizal Tresna Ramadhani

Journal of Materials Exploration and Findings

In the industrial world, to extend the service life of materials, protection methods are carried out to slow down the material's corrosion rate. The protection method that is often used is the coating method. The coating method is a protection method by coating the substrate material using a coating material to prevent contact between the substrate material and the environment. In this research, the substrate material used is ASTM A36 steel and the coating material used is Surface Tolerant Epoxy paint. The independent variable used in this study lies in the surface preparation method which consists of: solvent cleaning, hand …

Fitness For Service (Ffs) And Fatigue Assessment For Shell Distorted Steel Storage Tank Based On Api 579-1/Asme Ffs-1, Wira Herucakra Sr. Structure Engineer, Luh Putri Adnyani, Ic Farid Hadi Prasetyo, Alviani Rahma Rizkhita

Journal of Materials Exploration and Findings

A shell distortion was occurred due to incorrect in the welding procedure during construction of a new built above ground steel storage tank. The assessment level 1 then performed referred to original construction code of API Standard 650 was performed, the roundness data of tank plate was obtained through to laser scanning survey, and the result on assessment level 1 known that the minimum radius of measured point is exceeding the radius tolerance. This unacceptable condition of assessment level 1 requires to be performed the higher level of assessment. A fitness for service assessment level 3 for tank 1000 KL …

Ofet Informatics: Observing The Impact Of Organic Transistor's Design Parameters On The Device Output Performance Using A Machine Learning Algorithm, Sameh O. Abdellatif, Hana Masalam, Salma Ahmed

Electrical Engineering

No abstract provided.

Computer Security Lab Experiment, Orit D. Gruber, Herbert Schanker

Open Educational Resources

This is a basic experiment for all students of all majors to explore Computer Security. Each instruction included in this experiment is conducted online via a Web Browser; Firefox or Chrome is recommended. Software does not need to be downloaded nor installed. The step by step instructions in this experiment include interactive questions and observations which are then included in the (student's) final report.

Toward Intuitive 3d Interactions In Virtual Reality: A Deep Learning- Based Dual-Hand Gesture Recognition Approach, Trudi Di Qi, Franceli L. Cibrian, Meghna Raswan, Tyler Kay, Hector M. Camarillo-Abad, Yuxin Wen

Engineering Faculty Articles and Research

Dual-hand gesture recognition is crucial for intuitive 3D interactions in virtual reality (VR), allowing the user to interact with virtual objects naturally through gestures using both handheld controllers. While deep learning and sensor-based technology have proven effective in recognizing single-hand gestures for 3D interactions, research on dual-hand gesture recognition for VR interactions is still underexplored. In this work, we introduce CWT-CNN-TCN, a novel deep learning model that combines a 2D Convolution Neural Network (CNN) with Continuous Wavelet Transformation (CWT) and a Temporal Convolution Network (TCN). This model can simultaneously extract features from the time-frequency domain and capture long-term dependencies using …

05.13.2024 Orsp Connect, Liz Williamson

ORED Newsletter

Distinguished Research and Creative Achievement Award, Center for Practical Ethics, DARPA Connect, Air Force Internship