Engineering Commons^™

Intelligent And Explainable Solution To Predict Infant Birthweight And Preterm Birth In The United Arab Emirates, Wasif Khan

Dissertations

Adverse pregnancy outcomes such as Low Birth Weight (LBW) and Preterm birth (PTB) are complex pregnancy challenges that can lead to high perinatal mortality and long-term morbidity for infants. Early prediction of such adverse outcomes can be useful for averting catastrophic outcomes for the mother and her baby. With advances in machine learning (ML)-based algorithms, several models have been proposed for both PTB and LBW predictions. However, the risk factors associated with these outcomes are still unknown, particularly in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Furthermore, existing ML-based prediction models work in a black-box manner and lack proper interpretations for clinicians, …

Electrodialysis Process For The Simultaneous Treatment Of Reject Brine And Capture Of Carbon Dioxide, Jawad Mustafa

Dissertations

Desalination plants are highly efficient in producing desalinated water for potable applications. However, the process also generates reject brine, which is highly concentrated saline water. In order to produce 1 liter of potable water using desalination, approximately 1.5 liters of reject brine is generated. The disposal of reject brine presents a significant challenge for the desalination industry. Typically, this waste product is discharged into the sea, causing environmental damage, and polluting marine life. Moreover, certain countries heavily rely on desalination to meet their potable water needs, which results in the emission of greenhouse gases. As desalination plants consume a significant …

Roboretrieve--In A Dual Role As A Hand-Held Surgical Robot And A Collaborative Robot End-Effector To Perform Spillage-Free Specimen Retrieval In Laparoscopy, Siqin Dong

Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Recent advances in surgical robotics attempt to overcome limitations of manual surgery by augmenting the surgeon’s capabilities while performing suturing, incision, retraction, and retrieval tasks. This dissertation presents novel approaches for spillage-free specimen retrieval in confined spaces, targeted toward the surgical domain of minimally invasive robotic surgery. The retrieval task involves extraction of a resected specimen, residing in the abdominal cavity, completely outside of the patient’s body. A major challenge in this context is the spillage of content being retrieved, which may cause dissemination of malignancy. To address this challenge, this dissertation develops RoboRetrieve, a portable hand-held robot that …

Nanosecond Pulsed Electric Field Modulates Electron Transport And Mitochondrial Structure And Function, Lucas Nelson Potter

Biomedical Engineering Theses & Dissertations

Pulsed power treatment has been used to induce regulated cell death (RCD) in cells or ablate tumors in animals. A subset of pulsed power as electroporation with high voltage and pulse duration of milliseconds is used for biomedical treatment to induce pores in the plasma membrane of cells. Nanosecond Pulsed Electric Fields (nsPEFs)– an extension of electroporation, uses waveforms with pulse durations on the order of 10-900 nanoseconds. nsPEF treatment has demonstrated intracellular effects for potential biomedical applications. In this work, nsPEF treatment is used to demonstrate changes that affect viability, plasma membrane permeability ROS (Reactive Oxygen Species) in the …

Time-Dependent Wetting Behavior Of Hydrogels, Amir Kashani

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Hydrogels are 3-D polymers with hygroscopic properties that enable them to absorb and retain large amounts of water. In many applications such as biomedical applications, including drug delivery, wound healing, tissue engineering, biosensors, and contact lenses, agriculture, food and beverage, cosmetics, and environmental, hydrogels also need to maintain a high degree of wetting in order to ensure effective functionality and interaction with surrounding fluids or tissues in desired applications. The combination of wetting and absorptive behavior of hydrogels that are often encountered in biomedical, biological, industrial and the mentioned applications presents a challenging physical problem that is not completely understood. …

Wearable Sensor Gait Analysis For Fall Detection Using Deep Learning Methods, Haben Girmay Yhdego

Electrical & Computer Engineering Theses & Dissertations

World Health Organization (WHO) data show that around 684,000 people die from falls yearly, making it the second-highest mortality rate after traffic accidents [1]. Early detection of falls, followed by pneumatic protection, is one of the most effective means of ensuring the safety of the elderly. In light of the recent widespread adoption of wearable sensors, it has become increasingly critical that fall detection models are developed that can effectively process large and sequential sensor signal data. Several researchers have recently developed fall detection algorithms based on wearable sensor data. However, real-time fall detection remains challenging because of the wide …

Cortical Effects Of Wrist Tendon Vibration During An Arm Tracking Task In Chronic Stroke Survivors: An Eeg Study, Dylan B. Snyder, Scott A. Beardsley, Allison S. Hyngstrom, Brian D. Schmit

Biomedical Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

The purpose of this study was to characterize changes in cortical activity and connectivity in stroke survivors when vibration is applied to the wrist flexor tendons during a visuomotor tracking task. Data were collected from 10 chronic stroke participants and 10 neurologically-intact controls while tracking a target through a figure-8 pattern in the horizontal plane. Electroencephalography (EEG) was used to measure cortical activity (beta band desynchronization) and connectivity (beta band task-based coherence) with movement kinematics and performance error also being recorded during the task. All participants came into our lab on two separate days and performed three blocks (16 trials …

Government Aid Portal, Darshan Togadiya

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

In today’s world, contacting government officials seems a big task when it comes to reporting small concerns. There are many authorities and officials which makes it very difficult for ordinary people to figure out who they should contact to resolve their daily issues. To address this problem, I have developed an application which can act as intermediary between citizens and government authorities. This portal will enable locals to submit complaints regarding personal or general issues through a complaint form, which will then be routed to the appropriate government department. Once a complaint is filed, government teams are immediately alerted and …

A Long-Term Funds Predictor Based On Deep Learning, Shuiyi Kuang

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Numerous neural network models have been created to predict the rise or fall of stocks since deep learning has gained popularity, and many of them have performed quite well. However, since the share market is hugely influenced by various policy changes or unexpected news, it is challenging for investors to use such short-term predictions as a guide. In this paper, we try to find a suitable long-term predictor for the funds market by testing different kinds of neural network models, including the Long Short-Term Memory(LSTM) model with different layers, the Gated Recurrent Units(GRU) model with different layers, and the combination …

Bridging The Gap Between Public Organizaions And Cybersecurity, Christopher Boutros

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Cyberattacks are a major problem for public organizations across the nation, and unfortunately for them, the frequency of these attacks is constantly growing. This project used a case study approach to explore the types of cybersecurity public organization agencies face and how those crimes can be mitigated. The goal of this paper is to understand how public organization agencies have prepared for cyberattacks and discuss additional suggestions to improve their current systems with the current research available This research provides an analysis of current cyber security systems, new technologies that can be implemented, roadblocks public agencies face before and during …

Pillow Based Sleep Tracking Device Using Raspberry Pi, Venkatachalam Seviappan

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Almost half of all people have sleep interruptions at some point in their lives, making sleep disorders a common issue that affects a sizeable section of the population. Both their physical and emotional well-being may suffer as a result of this.Insomnia, which is a prevalent sleep disorder, is identified by symptoms including insufficient sleep duration and quality, trouble initiating sleep, multiple nighttime awakenings, early morning awakenings, and non-restorative sleep. It is essential to employ sleep monitoring systems to detect sleeping disorders as soon as possible for prompt diagnosis and treatment. To avoid sleep related health issues, there are plenty of …

Human Suspicious Activity Detection, Nilamben Bhuva

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The detection of suspicious human activity is a crucial aspect of ensuring public safety and security. The aim is to identify suspicious behavior. To accomplish this, we employ the LRCN, a long-term recurrent convolutional network, to detect anomalous activity. It is important to consider the temporal data of the video when classifying suspicious behavior, and the framework uses a combination of CNNs and RNNs to analyze video frames and extract relevant features. The key milestones of this project include conducting research, collecting and pre-processing data, designing and training the model, and evaluating its performance. The resulting detection system can accurately …

Accounting And Financial Statements Auto Analysis System, Zhen Jia

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This project was motivated by the need to revolutionize the generation of financial statements and financial analysis process thus speeding up business decision making. The research questions were: 1) How can machine learning increase the speed of financial statement preparation and automate financial statements analysis? 2) How can businesses balance the benefits of automating financial analysis with potential concerns around privacy, data security, and bias? 3) Can the Java J2EE framework provide a reliable running environment for machine learning?

The findings were: 1) Machine learning can significantly increase the accuracy and speed of financial analysis. Using machine learning algorithms, financial …

Meat Quality Prediction Using Machine Learning, Rohit Buddiga

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Meat quality is an essential aspect of the food industry. However, traditional methods of meat quality prediction have limitations in terms of accuracy, cost, and time efficiency. This project focused on utilizing advanced Deep learning and Machine learning algorithms to develop- machine learning models that could predict the freshness (or spoilage) of meat with a 100% accuracy, based on image data. In addition to accuracy, this study emphasizes the significance of speed and time in selecting the optimal machine learning model. The research questions are: Q1. What hybrid neural networks should be used to predict freshness? Q2. How do hybrid …

Trees Recommendation In Agroforestry Ecosystem Using Nlp, Omkar Sawant

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Agroforestry farming is one of the challenging sectors to grow the crops or farming or variety of trees from the ancient days due to erosion and desertification. This Culminating Experience Project explored how recommendation system can be developed and used in agroforestry. The research questions are Q1. What methods can be used to improve the accuracy and reliability of soil-based agroforestry tree species recommendation systems? Q2. How can agroforestry tree species recommendation systems be tailored to the needs of different stakeholders, such as smallholder farmers or agribusinesses? Q3. What will be the top three, tree recommendations using natural language processing …

Laying The Foundation For A Miniatuairzed Scada Testbed To Be Built At Csusb, Ryan Perera

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This culminating experience sought to lay the foundation for a miniaturized physical SCADA testbed to be built at California State University San Bernardino to enable students to apply the cybersecurity knowledge, skills and abilities in a fun and engaging environment while learning about what SCADA is, how it works, and how to improve the security of it. This project was conducted in response to a growing trend of cybersecurity attacks that have targeted our critical infrastructure systems through SCADA systems which are legacy systems that manage critical infrastructure systems within the past 10 years. Since SCADA systems require constant availability, …

Leveraging Blockchain Technology For Sla Enforcement In Health Care Cloud Partnerships, Shivani Uday Jahagirdar

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The healthcare industry is rapidly adopting cloud-based solutions to improve operational efficiency and patient outcomes. However, healthcare cloud partnerships often face challenges related to the lack of scalability, trust, and Service Level Agreement (SLA) enforcement, and has a notable impact on consumer care quality. To address this issue, the study proposed leveraging blockchain technology to enhance SLA enforcement by using smart contracts in health care cloud partnerships for small and medium-sized facilities. The research questions were: Q.1 What are the current challenges facing small to medium sized healthcare facilities in enforcing SLAs in cloud partnerships? Q.2 How can BC-based smart …

Structure-Property-Processing Analysis Of Graphene Bioscaffolds For Viability And Differentiation Of C2c12 Cells, Lynn Karriem

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

We investigated the structure – property – processing correlation of graphene bioscaffolds produced using three different methods. Bioscaffolds were prepared by chemical vapor deposition (CVD), sublimation of Silicon Carbide (SiC), and printed solvent assisted exfoliated graphene ink. To gain insight into the roughness and topography of graphene, AFM was performed on each bioscaffold. Raman spectroscopy mapping demonstrated differences in the I_2D/I_G ratio for each scaffold. Young’s modulus was determined by nanoindentation and indicated that epitaxial graphene had the highest average stiffness, followed by CVD, with printed graphene demonstrating the lowest average stiffness. To investigate the biocompatibility of …

Black Phosphorus Ink Formulation For Aerosol Jet Printing, Florent Muramutsa

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

As the demand for data-driven technologies such as cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and the Internet of Things increases, the value of data centers rises. However, the cost of optical interconnects that convert optical signals to electrical signals and vice versa limits the bandwidth in these data centers. Historically the optoelectronic materials of group III–V semiconductor materials are grown using epitaxy and transferred to silicon microelectronics using robotic pick-and-place technology. This costly method restricts the large-scale production of on-chip optoelectronic components such as diodes, photodetectors, and lasers. In this dissertation, we investigated the potential of black phosphorus (BP) as a material …

Closed-Loop, Recyclable Plastics From Ethyl Cyanoacrylate, Allison Joy Christy

Boise State University Theses and Dissertations

Ethyl cyanoacrylate, commonly known as super glue, has held a prominent role as an adhesive for decades due to its propensity to rapidly polymerize into poly(ethyl cyanoacrylate) (PECA) under ambient conditions. Ethyl cyanoacrylate monomers and their resulting PECA polymers are bio-friendly, which has allowed them to be used as medical adhesives and to be applied to drug delivery systems. However, PECA has not been used as a plastic material due to the perceived difficulty of handling the ethyl cyanoacrylate monomer. Here, we present a novel PECA plastic that displays thermal stability and tensile strength values that are comparable to atactic …

Experimental And Numerical Investigation Of The Effect Of Water Cooling On The Temperature Distribution Of Photovoltaic Modules Using Copper Pipes, Mohammad Hassan Shojaeefard, Noor Barzan Sakran, Mohammad Mazidi Sharfabadi, Omar A. Hussein, Hussein A. Mohammed

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

In hot climates, PV efficiency drops dramatically if the surface temperature of the panels rises over a specific limit. Consequently, a cooling system is required to preserve PV modules as close to their operating temperature as feasible. For this purpose, the influence of an increase in PV surface temperature on PV performance was studied experimentally and numerically at the Research Institute of Petroleum Industry (RIPI) in July. The current study uses a cooling system consisting of rows of copper pipes connected to the PV backside. The experiments are conducted for four distinct scenarios, each with a different input fluid temperature …

Peak To Average Power Ratio Reduction In Spectrally Efficient Fdm Using Repeated Clipping And Filtering, Buthaina Mosa Omran, Yamaan Esmiel Majeed, Iftekhar Ahmad

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Multi-carrier transmission may be considered one of the important developments in wireless communications. Spectrally efficient frequency division multiplexing (SEFDM) is a promising multi-carrier modulation which can significantly improve utilization of spectral. The SEFDM has high peak to average power ratio (PAPR) like any multicarrier system. High PAPR reduces the random forest (RF) transmitter power amplifier efficiency, which minimize the use of this technique in limited power supply transmitters. In this work, a repeated clipping and filtering method is introduced to reduce the PAPR in SEFDM with minimum or no out of band radiation. The results of the simulated approach show …

Tensile Performance Of Cast-In Headed Anchors In Ambient-Temperature Cured Fly Ash-Based Geopolymer Concretes With Varying Fracture Energies, Trijon Karmokar, Alireza Mohyeddin, Jessey Lee

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

The performance of cast-in headed anchors subjected to tensile loading in ambient-temperature cured fly ash-based geopolymer concrete was investigated in this research. Varying sizes of anchors were installed in geopolymer concrete at effective embedment depths ranging between 40 mm and 90 mm. The new experimental results were compared with those of a previous study on the tensile performance of anchors in geopolymer concrete with similar compressive and tensile strengths, but different fracture energy and elastic modulus. The influence on the concrete cone capacity and its angle due to the varying anchor head size ratio and fracture energy were evaluated in …

Effects Of Different Inlet Configurations On The Performance Of Solar Storage Tanks: A Three-Dimensional Unsteady Cfd Simulation, Abdellah Shafieian, Hamid Reza Bahrami, Amin Roostaee, Seyed Sina Feyzi

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

A validated three-dimensional unsteady computational fluid dynamics analysis is performed in this study to investigate the effects of the inlet flow conditions on the thermal performance of solar storage tanks. First, effects of different mass flow rates on the thermal performance of a simple tank (Model 1, single inlet and single outlet) are investigated. The results show that higher mass flow rates deteriorate thermocline and thermal stratification which is desirable. To reduce the unfavorable effects of inlet jet mixing with stagnant fluid, the mass flow rates are divided equally between two inlet ports in the next model (Model 2). The …

Catalytical Performance Of Heteroatom Doped And Undoped Carbon-Based Materials, Jahangir Alom, Md Saif Hasan, Md Asaduzaman, Mohammad Taufiq Alam, Dalel Belhaj, Raja Selvaraj, Md Ashraf Hossain, Masoumeh Zargar, Mohammad Boshir Ahmed

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Developing cost-effective, eco-friendly, efficient, stable, and unique catalytic systems remains a crucial issue in catalysis. Due to their superior physicochemical and electrochemical properties, exceptional structural characteristics, environmental friendliness, economic productivity, minimal energy demand, and abundant supply, a significant amount of research has been devoted to the development of various doped carbon materials as efficient catalysts. In addition, carbon-based materials (CBMs) with specified doping have lately become significant members of the carbon group, showing promise for a broad range of uses (e.g., catalysis, environmental remediation, critical chemical production, and energy conversion and storage). This study will, therefore, pay attention to the …

Track-Index-Guided Sustainable Off-Road Operations Using Visual Analytics, Image Intelligence And Optimal Delineation Of Track Features, Manoj Kumar Kalra, Sanjay Kumar Shukla, Ashutosh Trivedi

Research outputs 2022 to 2026

Visual-analytics-guided systems are replacing human efforts today. In many applications, movement in off-road terrain is required. Considering the need to negotiate various soft ground and desertic conditions, the beaten tracks of leading vehicles considered to be safe and suitable for guiding are used in such operations. During night, often, these tracks pass through low-contrast conditions posing difficulty in their identification. The maximization of track contrast is therefore desired. Many contrast enhancement techniques exist but their effectiveness varies as per the surrounding. Other than conventional techniques, the role of texture too becomes important for enhancing the differentiable track contrast. Gray-level co-occurrence …

Breath Analysis For Detection Of Lung Cancer With Hybrid Sensor-Based Electronic Nose, Ümi̇t Özsandikcioğlu, Ayten Atasoy

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

Lung cancer has the highest death rates among all types of cancer worldwide. Detection of lung cancer in its early stages significantly increases the survival rate. In this study, the aim is to improve the lung cancer detection performance of electronic noses (e-noses) with breath analysis by using two different types of gas sensor-based e-nose. The developed e-nose system consists of 14 quartz crystal microbalance (QCM) sensors and 8 metal oxide semiconductor (MOS) sensors. Breath samples were collected from a total of 100 volunteers, including 60 patients with lung cancer, 20 healthy nonsmokers, and 20 healthy smokers, and were classified …

Analysis And Implementation Of A New High-Buck Dc-Dc Converter With Interleaved Output Inductors And Soft Switching Capability, Sajad Ghabeli Sani, Mohamad Reza Banaei, Seyed Hossein Hosseini

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

This paper proposes an innovative structure for DC-DC converters with high buck gain by using a lower number of elements. The converter provides highly efficient output power and an extended output voltage range. In addition, the distribution of output current between two inductors and the soft-switching capability of the power switches have made the converter suitable for applications that require high output current. All power switches accomplish the ZVZCS (zero-voltage and zero-current switching) condition with the aid of a small auxiliary inductor (Lx), which charges and discharges parallel capacitors of main switches to provide soft-switching conditions. Thus, the switching losses …

Integration Of Neural Network And Distance Relay To Improve The Fault Localization On Transmission Lines, Linh Tran

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

Power transmission lines are integral and very important components of power systems. Because of the length of these lines and the complexity of the power grids, the lines may encounter various incidents such as lightning strike, shortage, and breakage. When an incident or a fault occurs, a fast process of identification, localization, and isolation of the fault is desired. An accurate fault localization would have a great impact in reducing the restoration time of the system. One of the most popular solutions for fault detection and localization is the distance relays using the impedance-based algorithms. However, these relays are still …

Quadratic Programming Based Partitioning For Block Cimmino With Correct Value Representation, Zuhal Taş, Fahreddi̇n Şükrü Torun

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

The block Cimmino method is successfully used for the parallel solution of large linear systems of equations due to its amenability to parallel processing. Since the convergence rate of block Cimmino depends on the orthogonality between the row blocks, advanced partitioning methods are used for faster convergence. In this work, we propose a new partitioning method that is superior to the state-of-the-art partitioning method, GRIP, in several ways. Firstly, our proposed method exploits the Mongoose partitioning library which can outperform the state-of-the-art methods by combining the advantages of classical combinatoric methods and continuous quadratic programming formulations. Secondly, the proposed method …