Engineering Commons^™

Using Stream Restoration To Mitigate Stormwater Runoff In An Urban Watershed: A Case Study, Jonathan M. Brantley

Theses and Dissertations--Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering

The goal of this case study was to evaluate the effectiveness a 275 m regenerative stream restoration design to mitigate stormwater runoff in a highly urbanized watershed. The restoration resulted in a wide, wetland-like floodplain, comprised of a rock base that was overtopped with a filtration media (approximately 30% woodchips and 70% topsoil). The creation of the floodplain-wetland complex in tandem with filtration media lead to increased storage capacity and an increase in hyporheic exchange within the system. Significant reductions were found for the storm hydrograph parameters volume, peak discharge, and time to peak. Reductions in baseflows were also noted …

Non-Destructive Characterization Of Bio-Cemented Soils Via Seismic Wave Measurement, Kyle Best

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

The final outcome of this project is to examine the mechanical and resulting physical properties of bio-treated soil through microbial activity via non-destructive testing by seismic waves. The proposed bio-treatment strategy is through supplying specific nutrients for indigenous microbes within a soil specimen which in return produce calcium carbonates. The bio-minerals produced during these biogeochemical activities will improve the mechanical properties of soil by making cementation between soil grains. Additionally, a theoretical laboratory experimentational description will be provided to explain any associative effects on a specimen's water permeability or mechanical strength due to bio-mineralization within the samples. The characterization of …

Improving Network Policy Enforcement Using Natural Language Processing And Programmable Networks, Pinyi Shi

Theses and Dissertations--Computer Science

Computer networks are becoming more complex and challenging to operate, manage, and protect. As a result, Network policies that define how network operators should manage the network are becoming more complex and nuanced. Unfortunately, network policies are often an undervalued part of network design, leaving network operators to guess at the intent of policies that are written and fill in the gaps where policies don’t exist. Organizations typically designate Policy Committees to write down the network policies in the policy documents using high-level natural languages. The policy documents describe both the acceptable and unacceptable uses of the network. Network operators …

Design, Development And Benchmarking Of Machine Learning Algorithms In Biomedical Applications, Qi Sun

Theses and Dissertations--Computer Science

Machine learning algorithms are becoming the most effective methods for knowledge discovery from high dimensional datasets. Machine learning seeks to construct predictive models through the analysis of large-scale heterogeneous data. While machine learning has been widely used in many domains including computer vision, natural language processing, product recommendation, its application in biomedical science for clinical diagnosis and treatment is only emerging. However, the wealthy amount of data in the biomedical domain offers not only challenges but also opportunities for machine learning. In this dissertation, we focus on three biomedical applications from vastly different domains to understand the opportunities and challenges …

Protocols And Architecture For Privacy-Preserving Authentication And Secure Message Dissemination In Vehicular Ad Hoc Networks, Shafika Showkat Moni

Theses and Dissertations--Computer Science

The rapid development in the automotive industry and wireless communication technologies have enhanced the popularity of Vehicular ad hoc networks (VANETs). Today, the automobile industry is developing sophisticated sensors that can provide a wide range of assistive features, including accident avoidance, automatic lane tracking, semi-autonomous driving, suggested lane changes, and more. VANETs can provide drivers a safer and more comfortable driving experience, as well as many other useful services by leveraging such technological advancements. Even though this networking technology enables smart and autonomous driving, it also introduces a plethora of attack vectors. However, the main issues to be sorted out …

Image Geo-Localization With Cross-Attention, Connor Greenwell

Theses and Dissertations--Computer Science

The problem of estimating the location from which un-geotagged photographs were captured has been well studied by the computer vision community in recent years. The central proposal of this thesis is to define a common framework within which existing approaches can be constructed and evaluated, and to introduce a new method under this framework which uses cross-attention between the query image and a database of satellite imagery with known geotags. Our experiments fit within three broad categories: 1) evaluating the ability of image localization approaches to generalize to unseen regions; 2) examining performance changes under various reference database resolutions, scales, …

An Automated Framework To Debug System-Level Concurrency Failures, Tarannum Shaila Zaman

Theses and Dissertations--Computer Science

The ever-increasing parallelism in computer systems has made software more prone to concurrency failures, causing problems during both pre- and post-development. Debugging concurrent programs is difficult because of the non-deterministic behavior and the specific sequences of interleaving in the execution flow. Debugging is a technique where programmers reproduce the bug, identify the root cause, and then take necessary steps to remove the bug from the system. The failure information may come from the bug reports of the testing phase or the production runs. In both cases, there should be steps taken to reproduce and localize the failure. However, reproducing and …

License Plate Image Quality Enhancement Utilizing Super Resolution Generative Adversarial Networks, Mark Moelter

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

This thesis focuses primarily on enhancing the image quality of blurred license plates through the use of Super-Resolution Generative Adversarial Networks (SRGANs) [1]. We propose a synthetic dataset with SRGAN model to promote blurred image quality enhancement, and allow for model evaluation on a multitude of image input and output size combinations. SRGAN is mainly used for low-resolution image enhancement, but by heavily blurring the input images, the model is tested on its ability to blindly deblur and upsample images to the desired super-resolution (SR) size. The model enhances the image quality to nearly that of the reference images. The …

Deep Residual Policy Reinforcement Learning As A Corrective Term In Process Control For Alarm Reduction: A Preliminary Report, Ammar N. Abbas, Georgios C. Chasparis, John Kelleher

Articles

Conventional process controllers (such as proportional integral derivative controllers and model predictive controllers) are simple and effective once they have been calibrated for a given system. However, it is difficult and costly to re-tune these controllers if the system deviates from its normal conditions and starts to deteriorate. Recently, reinforcement learning has shown a significant improvement in learning process control policies through direct interaction with a system, without the need of a process model or the system characteristics, as it learns the optimal control by interacting with the environment directly. However, developing such a black-box system is a challenge when …

Adapting Nlp Techniques In Transfer Learning For Forensic Authorship Profiling, Esam Alzahrani

All ETDs from UAB

Cybercrimes have risen and caused threats to regular internet users. In recent times, the increased use of online social networks (OSNs) allows people to easily share opinions, personal information, and others. Since a major part of OSNs content is textual content, immense research has focused on text analysis techniques using machine learning and Natural Language Processing (NLP). One important area of research focused on text analysis using machine learning is forensic text analysis. Digital forensics is a discipline concerns finding, preserving, and presenting admissible evidence in court. Sadly, the convenience of OSNs creates an optimal venue for cybercriminals to perform …

A Hybrid Data And Hypothesis-Driven Model For Software Development In Support Of The Machine-Learning Paradigm, Anthony D. Bowman

All ETDs from UAB

istorically, research has often been conducted in a hypothesis-driven manner with software development methodologies created to support those efforts. However, in recent years data-driven approaches to research have seen a dramatic rise in prominence. While software development methodologies such as agile development, extreme programming, and the waterfall model have allowed developers to tackle increasingly complex problems, they were not designed to efficiently support data-driven approaches such as the machine learning paradigm. To address the need to support the different programmatic requirements of both classical, hypothesis-driven as well as data-driven development, novel development strategies are warranted. In this research, we adapted …

Monoclonal Antibody-Mediated Cancer Treatment: Development, Manufacturing And Evaluation, Yingnan Si

All ETDs from UAB

Malignant cancer is one of the greatest threats to human health globally. Conventional (non-targeted) treatments such as chemo-drugs and radiation therapy remain the major choices for cancer patients while always accompanied by severe systemic toxicity/side effects. Monoclonal antibody (mAb) is one of the most successful biomolecules discovered and well investigated as a targeted therapy to treat human disease. This dissertation research was aimed to develop monoclonal antibody-based targeted drugs for cancer treatment, which include antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs), liposomal drug and exosome-based drug delivery. Novel targets were discovered, screened and confirmed by proteomics, western blotting and flow cytometry analysis. Cancer cells …

Pkd-1 Signaling Inthe Regulation Of Cancer Stem Cell-Like Features And Cancer Cell Interactions With Endothelial Cells In Breast Cancer And Pancreatic Neuroendocrine Tumor, Yichen Hailey Guo

All ETDs from UAB

Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are a subpopulation cancer cells that play critical roles in tumor progression, recurrence, metastasis, and drug resistance. CSCs are characterized by self-renewal and plasticity. Protein kinase D-1 (PKD-1) signaling regulates CSC/stemness features in both breast cancers and pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors. In PNETs, PKD-1 signaling regulates not only stemness properties of cancer, but also epithelial-mesenchymal transition (EMT). PNETs are typically well vascularized and heterogeneous. Everolimus (an mTOR inhibitor and the 2nd generation derivative of rapamycin) has been approved as a targeted chemotherapy for PNET patients. Unfortunately, nearly all patients will progress on treatment due to drug resistance …

The Role Ofbiomechanics In Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor Receptor-2 Signaling, Bronte Miller

All ETDs from UAB

Angiogenesis, or the growth of new vasculature from existing blood vessels, is widely considered a primary hallmark of cancer progression. When a tumor is small, diffusion is sufficient to receive essential nutrients; however, as the tumor grows a vascular supply is needed to deliver oxygen and nutrients into the increasing mass. Several anti-angiogenic cancer therapies target VEGF and its receptor VEGFR-2, which are major promoters of blood vessel development. Unfortunately, many of these cancer treatments fail to completely stop angiogenesis in the tumor microenvironment (TME). Since these therapies focus on the biochemical activation of VEGFR-2 via VEGF ligand binding, we …

Revision Total Hip Femoral Stem Micromotion And Statistical Shape Modeling Of The Knee, William Fugit

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The first purpose of this thesis was to compare the amount of micromotion seen in the femoral stem in a revision total hip arthroplasty between simple loading conditions and loading conditions derived from activities of daily living, through the use of experimental and computational methods. The amount of micromotion at the bone-implant interface was larger for activities of daily living, with ranges of 200μm more than the largest simple loading conditions. The second purpose of this thesis was to compare measurements of accuracy in a statistical shape model between individual bone and joint-level models, specifically for the knee. Using computational …

Integrated Structural Health Monitoring Techniques Using Drome Sensors, Abdelaziz Ibrahem Mohammed Abdellatef

All ETDs from UAB

Bridges, as long-life large structures, are considered a challenge in both their construction and maintenance. Since they are subjected to frequent cyclic loads normally and accidents occasionally, they are prone to possible damages during their lifetime. There-fore, Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) is a must to avoid collapse or undesired closing. Various methods are used for that purpose that differ in their cost, efficiency, and ac-curacy. To obtain a better understating of the acceleration records of the bridge, the response of the vibrating beam subjected to stationary or moving mass is first studied by solving the equations of motion of both …

Ensemble Approach To The Semantic Segmentation Of Satellite Images, Brendan Kent

Dissertations

Automatic classification and segmentation of land use land cover(LULC) is extremely important for understanding the relationship between humans and nature. Human pressures on the environment have drastically accelerated in the last decades, risking biodiversity and ecosystem services. Remote sensing via satellite imagery is an excellent tool to study LULC. Research has shown that deep learning encoder-decoder architectures have achieved worthy results in the area of LULC, however the application of an ensemble approach has not been well quantified. Studies have shown it to be useful in the area of medical imaging. Ensembling by pooling together predictions to produce better predictions …

Adhesively Bonded Multi-Material Single Lap Joints Under Static Tensile Loading, Yesim Kokner

Dissertations and Theses

Adhesive joints are widely used in a variety of industrial applications utilizing the improved mechanical properties they provide over traditional mechanical joining methods. [1] The lap joint is a usual test specimen with a view to assessing the strength and properties of joints.

This study deals with the stiffness, strength and fracture behavior of multi-material single-lap joints. It describes the mechanical behavior of a multi-material single lap joints subjected to static tensile loading in the longitudinal direction. First, steel-to-steel and aluminum-to-aluminum joints are tested to establish baseline data. Subsequently, multi-material joints consisting of aluminum-to-steel, aluminum-to-composite, and steel-to-composite joints were tested …

A Study Of Greenhouse Gas Emissions And Performance Of An Internal Combustion Engine Operating On Landfill Gas Blends As Fuel, Lauren T. Creadore

Dissertations and Theses

Landfill gas (LFG) is an abundant resource naturally occurring from the decomposition of municipal solid waste. It can be generated in U.S. landfills at a rate of 24.2 to 59.1 GNm³ per year.¹ LFG presents both a problem and solution with respect to global warming. Composed of carbon dioxide (CO₂, 30-40%) and methane (CH₄, 45-55%), as well as nitrogen (N₂, 10-15%), oxygen (O₂, 0-5%), and other trace gasses¹, LFG that is permitted release into the atmosphere will contribute to the greenhouse gas effect due to the presence of …

Test 2260: John Deere 9r 490, Nebraska Tractor Test Lab

Nebraska Tractor Tests

ABOUT THE TEST REPORT AND USE OF THE DATA The test data contained in this report are a tabulation of the results of a series of tests. Due to the restricted format of these pages, only a limited amount of data and not all of the tractor specifications are included. The full OECD report contains usually about 30 pages of data and specifications. The test data were obtained for each tractor under similar conditions and therefore, provide a means of comparison of performance based on a limited set of reported data. EXPLANATION OF THE TEST PROCEDURES Purpose The purpose of …

Neural Network Attitude Control System Design For The Wallops Arc-Second Pointer, Pavel Galchenko, Henry J. Pernicka

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

No abstract provided.

The Lognometer: A New Normalized And Computerized Device For Assessing The Neurodevelopment Of Fine Motor Control In Children, Christian O'Reilly, Rejean Plamondon, Nadir Faci

Publications

Motor skills are fundamental for the development of children. Neurodevelopmental tests currently used by professionals for measuring motor control maturity exhibit several limitations. To address some of these, we have designed the Lognometer, a tablet-based device that can run computerized neuromotor tests. To normalize this tool against a representative population, we collected handwritten triangles from 780 children. We used the Sigma-Lognormal model and a prototype-based parameter estimation algorithm to analyze these movements. To ensure clinical acceptance, we developed an explainable solution relying on statistical regression. We evaluated how well the proposed lognormal decomposition captures the motor control maturation between 6 …

Ksat: Knowledge-Infused Self Attention Transformer - Integrating Multiple Domain-Specific Contexts, Kaushik Roy, Yuxin Zi, Vignesh Narayanan, Manas Gaur, Amit P. Sheth

Publications

Domain-specific language understanding requires integrating multiple pieces of relevant contextual information. For example, we see both suicide and depression related behavior (multiple contexts) in the text “I have a gun and feel pretty bad about my life, and it wouldn’t be the worst thing if I didn’t wake up tomorrow”. Domain specificity in self-attention architectures is handled by fine-tuning on excerpts from relevant domain specific resources (datasets and external knowledge - medical textbook chapters on mental health diagnosis related to suicide and depression). We propose a modified self-attention architecture Knowledge infused Self Attention Transformer (KSAT) that achieves the integration of …

Heat Generation Of Aircraft Tires At Landing, Yu Li, Dr. Weiji Wang

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

When the aircraft lands on a runway, the great speed difference between tires and runway causes non-negligible friction and speeds up wheels. The generated heat rapidly raises tire temperature and causes material decomposition, which leads to replacement cost and flight safety issues; the chemical substances in the air can also cause emission problems. Many studies on aircraft tire temperature are based on software simulation or experiments. The simulation result may be affected by unnecessary variables due to cumbersome modelling, and the observation result may be inaccurate due to a particularly dynamic friction process. On the other side, there are few …

Classifıcation Of Survivor/Non-Survivor Passengers In Fatal Aviation Accidents: A Machine Learning Approach, Tüzün Tolga İnan Dr.

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

The safety concept primarily examines the most fatal (resulting in dead passengers) accidents of aviation history in this study. The primary causes of most fatal accidents are; human, technical, and sabotage/terrorism factors. Although the aviation industry started with the first engine flight in 1903, the safety concept has been examined since the 1950s. The safety concept firstly examined the technical factors, and in the late 1970s, human factors started to analyze. Despite these primary causes, there have different factors that affect accidents. So, the study aims to determine the affecting factors of the most fatal accidents to classify the survivor/non-survivor …

Uas For Public Safety: Active Threat Recognition, Joseph Cerreta, Tray Denney, Scott S. Burgess, Anthony Galante, David Thirtyacre, Gloria A. Wilson, Patrick Sherman

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

The Center for Homeland Defense and Security identified an increase of active threat events, such as mass shootings, annually since 1999. Literature suggests that 90% of shootings were over before law enforcement arrived at the scene and the first responder response was limited to “surround and contain” until Special Weapons and Tactics Teams (SWAT) arrived on the scene. Using Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) to detect which individual was the threat and type of weapon used can provide useful information to increase the speed of the response for first-on-scene rather than waiting for SWAT if the type of weapon was known. …

Modelling Air Quality In An Aircraft Passenger Cabin Using Health Care Standards, Bert Silich

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

The interest in aerosol contamination of aircraft passenger cabins has increased since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Mathematical models have been developed to help describe how an aerosol behaves in a closed space. The number of infectious particles inhaled is of scientific interest because it can be related to the risk of getting ill from a pathogen. The data required to calculate these results is often difficult to obtain in real world settings. In fact, particle inhalation details are not obtained in the day-to-day routine of a health care environment and are they not required to maintain safety. Hospital …

Anthropometry Considerations In The Design And Evaluation Of Flight Deck Displays And Controls: Literature Review, Robert Joslin

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

The regulatory requirements and guidance for showing compliance with the Federal Aviation Administration anthropometric considerations in aircraft design are widely dispersed in an array of source documents. Consequently, they are difficult for aircraft manufacturers/applicants to identify, interpret, and address thereby extending the time to certify new/modified aircraft and aircraft systems. This literature review is intended to provide a compendium of the anthropometry considerations in the design certification of displays and controls in aircraft flight decks. This document is not a compliance document and the references herein are frequently updated, hence should be verified by the reader.

Effectiveness Of A Flight Simulation Training Visual Aid For Normal And Crosswind Approach And Landing, Shlok Misra, Victor Fraticelli Rivera, Nikhil Khale, Jorge L. D. Albelo Ph.D.

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

Flight simulators have a significant contribution to effective and efficient flight training across the globe. Significant literature has suggested the effectiveness of simulation tools in training pilots in different scenarios and is an area for continued development and research. To continue those efforts, this study assessed the effectiveness of visual aid to be used as an instructional aid for flight instruction for crosswind landings. The need for further training in crosswind landing is substantiated due to the significantly high number of accidents for General Aviation aircraft in the approach and landing phase of flights. The study utilized an experimental research …

Ga Pilot Perceptions Of Speech Systems To Transcribe And Submit Pireps, Deborah S. Carstens Ph.D., Pmp, Michael S. Harwin, J.D., M.S., Tianhua Li, Ph.D., Brandon J. Pitts, Ph.D., Mel Futrell, M.A., Barrett Caldwell, Ph.D.

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

Flying into hazardous weather can be a cause of aviation incidents and accidents. Accidents involving general aviation (GA) pilots who are not instrument rated who fly into instrument meteorological conditions (IMC) are often fatal. Pilot weather reports (PIREPs) can increase the accuracy and timeliness of current and forecasted weather conditions. They are an essential tool used by pilots to avoid flying into hazardous weather as well as meteorologists to develop and update aviation forecasts. Thus, a large number of accurate PIREPs with the best source of current weather coming from pilots and air traffic controllers are needed. Pilots are often …