Engineering Commons^™

The Influences Of Calculus I On Engineering Student Persistence, Amie Baisley

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

About half of the students that are declared engineering majors end up leaving engineering within their first two years at the university. This happens following the required math and science courses that these students must take before getting into the technical engineering coursework. There are two systems that students must be a part of at the university to feel comfortable and have the desire to continue on in their degree. These include the academic system and the social system. The experiences engineering students have during their first required math course, Calculus I, is likely not promoting integration into these two …

Rapid Prediction Of Low-Boom And Aerodynamic Performance Of Supersonic Transport Aircraft Using Panel Methods, Ted N. Giblette

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The Utah State University Aerolab developed and tested a set of tools for rapid prediction of the loudness of a sonic boom generated by supersonic transport aircraft. This work supported a larger effort led by Texas A&M to investigate the use of adaptive aerostructures in lowering sonic boom loudness at off design conditions. Successful completion of this effort will improve the feasibility of supersonic commercial transport over land.

Funding was provided by a NASA University Leadership Initiative grant to several universities, including Utah State University, as well as industry partners to complete this work over a five year period. The …

Advancing Cyberinfrastructure For Collaborative Data Sharing And Modeling In Hydrology, Tian Gan

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Hydrologic research is increasingly data and computationally intensive, and often involves hydrologic model simulation and collaboration among researchers. With the development of cyberinfrastructure, researchers are able to improve the efficiency, impact, and effectiveness of their research by utilizing online data sharing and hydrologic modeling functionality. However, further efforts are still in need to improve the capability of cyberinfrastructure to serve the hydrologic science community. This dissertation first presents the evaluation of a physically based snowmelt model as an alternative to a temperature index model to improve operational water supply forecasts in the Colorado River Basin. Then it presents the design …

Built-In Return-Oriented Programs In Embedded Systems And Deep Learning For Hardware Trojan Detection, Nathanael R. Weidler

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Microcontrollers and integrated circuits in general have become ubiquitous in the world today. All aspects of our lives depend on them from driving to work, to calling our friends, to checking our bank account balance. People who would do harm to individuals, corporations and nation states are aware of this and for that reason they seek to find or create and exploit vulnerabilities in integrated circuits. This dissertation contains three papers dealing with these types of vulnerabilities. The first paper talks about a vulnerability that was found on a microcontroller, which is a type of integrated circuit. The final two …

Development And Testing Of A Hydrogen Peroxide Injected Thrust Augmenting Nozzle For A Hybrid Rocket, Mark C. Heiner

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

During a rocket launch, the point at which the most thrust is needed is at lift-off where the rocket is the heaviest since it is full of propellant. Unfortunately, this is also the point at which rocket engines perform the most poorly due to the relatively high atmospheric pressure at sea level. The Thrust Augmenting Nozzle (TAN) investigated in this paper provides a solution to this dilemma. By injecting extra propellant into the nozzle but downstream of the throat, the internal nozzle pressure is raised and the thrust is increased, and the nozzle efficiency, or specific impulse is potentially improved …

Gpu-Accelerated Demodulation For A Satellite Ground Station, Emily Clark Young

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

One consequence of the increasing number of small satellite missions is an increasing demand for high data rate downlinks. As the satellites transmit at high data rates, ground-side receivers need to demodulate the transmitted data as quickly as possible. While application specific hardware can be designed, software defined radio solutions for ground stations are attractive for their flexibility, adaptability, and portability.

Another industry trend is the increasing use of Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) in general-purpose processing. By performing many operations simultaneously, GPUs are capable of accelerating processing when given a problem that can be implemented in a parallel manner. Furthermore, …

Reducing Thermal Bridging And Understanding Second-Order Effects In Concrete Sandwich Wall Panels, Taylor J. Sorensen

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Structural engineers have traditionally detailed structures with structural and fabrication efficiency in mind, but often based on a limited understanding of thermal efficiency. Some connection designs can create significant thermal bridging, leading to unnecessary heat transfer and even premature degradation through condensation. Thermal bridging occurs when heat transfer is given a path through a more conductive material like concrete or steel rather than insulation. Concrete sandwich wall panels (SWP) tend to be highly efficient at preventing heat transfer in the middle of panels, with greatest heat transfer occurring at connections. This project identified thermally efficient details for future SWP construction …

Career Prospects And Resources Of Domestic Engineering Doctoral Students, Laura A. Gelles

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Career prospects are a motivating factor for entry and retention of doctoral students, especially in the discipline of engineering. While doctoral student training provides them with highly specialized skills to be an independent researcher, they may not have the requisite skills or guidance to secure the job position of their choice. Therefore, it is important to provide doctoral students with opportunities, training, and information (i.e., resources) about different types of careers to not only ensure they are productive contributors of teaching and research, but also equip them for future career prospects. Research techniques based upon in-depth narrative interviews and combining …

Energy Management Of Dynamic Wireless Power Transfer Systems For Electric Vehicle Applications, Ahmed N. Azad

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Wireless power transfer is a method of transferring electric power from a transmitter to a receiver without requiring any physical connection between the two. Dynamic Wireless Power Transfer (DWPT) entails having the transmitters buried under the roadway and the receiver unit being installed on the Electric Vehicle (EV). In this method, EVs are charged while driving over the transmitters as they receive bursts of electric energy at the time of significant alignment between transmitters and receivers. Compared to the stationary charging method which involves parking the EV for long hours for a full charge, the dynamic charging method (i.e., DWPT) …

Foreground Removal In A Multi-Camera System, Daniel T. Mortensen

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Traditionally, whiteboards have been used to brainstorm, teach, and convey ideas with others. However distributing whiteboard content remotely can be challenging. To solve this problem, A multi-camera system was developed which can be scaled to broadcast an arbitrarily large writing surface while removing objects not related to the whiteboard content. Related research has been performed previously to combine multiple images together, identify and remove unrelated objects, also referred to as foreground, in a single image and correct for warping differences in camera frames. However, this is the first time anyone has attempted to solve this problem using a multi-camera system. …

Revolution In Autonomous Orbital Navigation (Raon), Rachit Bhatia

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Spacecraft navigation is a critical component of any space mission. Space navigation uses on-board sensors and other techniques to determine the spacecraft’s current position and velocity, with permissible accuracy. It also provides requisite information to navigate to a desired position, while following the desired trajectory. Developments in technology have resulted in new techniques of space navigation. However, inertial navigation systems have consistently been the bedrock for space navigation.

Recently, the successful space mission GOCE used on-board gravity gradiometer for mapping Earth’s gravitational field. This has motivated the development of new techniques like cold atom accelerometers, to create ultra-sensitive gravity gradiometers, …

Expression Systems For Synthetic Spider Silk Protein Production, Michaela R. Hugie

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Spider silk is a biodegradable and biocompatible natural material that is stronger than steel and more elastic than nylon. These properties make spider silk a desirable material for many commercial products, ranging from textiles to biomedical materials. Due to spiders’ cannibalistic and territorial nature it is impossible to farm them to produce spider silk at a high enough yield to meet product demands. Therefore, a bioengineered synthetic process is necessary to produce spider silk. Synthetic spider silk has been produced in bacteria, goats, yeast, plants, mammalian cells and silkworms, but none of these processes provided a commercially viable yield or …

A New Approach For Evaluating The Ductility, Volumetric Stiffness, And Permeability Of Cutoff Wall Backfill Materials, Jennifer Ostrowsky

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The use of plastic concrete for cutoff walls in dams for remediation of seepage issues has become more widely used in the past 25 years, however, the in-situ material properties are still not well understood. The research presents a new testing procedure that combines two existing testing methods, triaxial shear and permeability testing. By developing this laboratory testing method, material properties of the cutoff wall backfill material can be more accurately examined and explained using changes in the permeability of the material to discern the ductility and stiffness.

Experimental Investigation Of N2o/O2 Mixtures As Volumetrically Efficient Oxidizers For Small Spacecraft Hybrid Propulsion Systems, Rob L. Stoddard

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

A hybrid thruster system utilizes propellants in two different stages, traditionally a solid fuel and a gaseous or liquid oxidizer. Recently hybrid thrusters have become a popular topic of research due to the high demand of a ”green” replacement for hydrazine. Not only are hybrid thruster systems typically much safer than hydrazine, but they are also a low-cost system with a high reliability in performance. The Propulsion Research Laboratory (PRL) at Utah State University (USU) has developed a hybrid thruster system using 3-D printed acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) as the fuel and gaseous oxygen (GOX) as the oxidizer. This system …

Hydro-Climatic Changes And Corresponding Impacts On Agricultural Water Demand In The Ganges Delta Of Bangladesh, Sonia Binte Murshed

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The Ganges Delta in Bangladesh, a transboundary rural river basin, is an example of water-related calamities due to natural and human-induced stresses. It is an agriculture-dominated area with the presence of Sundarbans mangrove forest. Recently this area is facing unfavorable conditions due to limitations in quantity, quality, and timing of available freshwater. As a result, floods, droughts, water scarcity, stream depletion, salinity intrusion, excessive sedimentation are becoming common phenomena. These calamities are making this area unsuitable for agriculture and vulnerable to the Sundarbans’ ecosystem. This study aims to provide technical insight into issues related to water scarcity and projected agricultural …

Reservoir Applications Of Arced Labyrinth Weirs, Seth D. Thompson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

In recent years, magnitudes of flood estimates used in hydraulic design have increased for many reservoirs. Consequently, many existing spillways are now deficient as they do not meet current discharge capacity requirements. To rehabilitate existing, fixed-width spillways, labyrinth weirs are often viable solutions. For reservoir applications, arcing labyrinth weirs into the reservoir increases hydraulic efficiency. This results from better cycle orientation to the approaching flow field.

This study supplements available arced labyrinth weir hydraulic data by observing flow characteristics of three laboratory-scale physical models and two numerical (CFD) models. Physical model results provide head (energy)-discharge data and empirical coefficients for …

Numerical Treatment Of Schrödinger’S Equation For One-Particle And Two-Particle Systems Using Matrix Method, Spatika Dasharati Iyengar

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

With an increased interest in accurately predicting aerothermal environments for planetary entry, recent researches have concentrated on developing high fidelity computational models using quantum-mechanical first principles. These calculations are dependent on solving the Schrödinger equation using molecular orbital theory techniques. They are either approximate solutions to actual equations or exact solutions to approximate equations. Exact solutions have not found favor due to the computational expense of the problem. Hence, a novel numerical approach is developed and tested here using linear algebraic matrix methods to enable precise solutions.

The finite-difference technique is used to cast the Time-Independent Schrödinger equation (TISE) in …

Feasibility Analysis Of Adipic Acid Production, Serpil Unlu

Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Adipic acid is an essential intermediate chemical feedstock for the production of nylon-6,6; hence it is valuable from an industrial perspective. Currently, commercial adipic acid production includes a combination of two stages. The first stage produces a mixture of cyclohexanone and cyclohexanol called ‘’KA oil” derived from cyclohexane. In the second stage, KA oil is reacted with nitric acid to produce adipic acid. The second stage generates excess N₂O emission, which is considered as 310 times more potent than CO₂. Renewable feedstocks that can be converted to value-added chemicals offer significant potential for the necessary transition …

Development Of A Mix Design Adjustment Method For Fiber Reinforced Concrete And Super High Performance Concrete Based On Excess Paste, Joe Malloy

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The main objective of this study was to develop a mix design adjustment method for Fiber Reinforced Concrete (FRC) that would maintain appropriate workability while improving hardened concrete performance. A literature review was conducted to examine existing methods for adjusting mix designs to account for fiber introduction. It was found that while increasing fine aggregate and cement paste content can make up for lost workability with the addition of fibers, no rational mix design adjustment method is available. Reference mix designs from the Nevada Department of Transportation and the Nebraska Department of Transportation were used, and this study focused on …

Nanothermomechanical Logic Gates For Thermal Computing, Ahmed Hamed

Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Limited performance and reliability of electronic devices at extreme temperatures, intensive electromagnetic fields, and radiation found in space exploration missions (i.e., Venus & Jupiter planetary exploration, and heliophysics missions) and earth-based applications require the development of alternative computing technologies. Thermal computing, data processing based on heat instead of electricity, is proposed as a practical alternative and opens a new scientific area at the interface between thermal and computational sciences.

We successfully developed thermal AND, OR and NOT logic gates, achieved through the coupling between near-field thermal radiation and MEMS thermal actuation. In the process, we developed two novel non-linear thermal …

Magnetic Properties Of Nd–Fe–B Permanent Magnets Under Thermal Experimentation, Géraldine Houis

Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Neodymium-Iron-Boron (Nd-Fe-B) magnets were developed in the 1980s, and since then, they have appeared as a common component in many fields. From the industry to consumers or defense applications, from turbines, computers, cellphones to most audio systems, Nd-Fe-B magnets are present everywhere. But when Nd-Fe-B magnets are applied to the motors of electric vehicles and wind-turbine generators, their temperature rises, therefore Nd-Fe-B-Dy magnets are used. However, while the use of these magnets is common at low temperatures, their properties decrease dramatically with the increase of temperature. In this paper, the Nd-Fe-B-based samples used were prepared by using arc melting, melt …

Extending Mission Duration Of Uas Multicopters: Multi-Disciplinary Approach, Marc Lussier

Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

Multicopters are important tools in industry, the military, and research but suffer from short flight times and mission durations. In this thesis, we discuss three different ways to increase flight times and therefore increase the viability of using multicopters in a variety of missions. Alternate fuel sources such as hydrogen fuel and solar cells are starting to be used on multicopters, in our research we simulate modern fuel cells and show how well they currently work as the power source for multicopters and how close they are to becoming useful in Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) technology. Increasing the efficiency in …

Of Promoting Networking And Protecting Privacy: Effects Of Defaults And Regulatory Focus On Social Media Users’ Preference Settings, Hichang Cho, Sungjong Roh, Byungho Park

Research Collection Lee Kong Chian School Of Business

Privacyresearch has debated whether privacy decision-making is determined by users'stable preferences (i.e., individual traits), privacy calculus (i.e.,cost-benefit analysis), or “responses on the spot” that vary across contexts.This study focuses on two factors—default setting as a contextual factor andregulatory focus as an individual difference factor—and examines the degree towhich these factors affect social media users' decisionmaking when usingprivacy preference settings in a fictitious social networking site. Theresults, based on two experimental studies (study 1, n = 414; study 2, n =213), show that default settings significantly affect users' privacypreferences, such that users choose the defaults or alternatives proximal tothem. Study 2 …

Multi-Scale Assessment Of Binding Geometries And Energetics Of Aqueous Phase Reforming Of Glycerol And Methanol: Towards Realistic, Accurate, And Computationally Tractable Strategies, Tianjun Xie

All Dissertations

No abstract provided.

Cavopulmonary Support For Failing Fontan Patients: Computational And In Vitro Assessment, Masoud Farahmand

All Dissertations

Congenital heart defects are responsible for the mortality of approximately 300,000 newborn each year. One study in 2010 estimated that over 2 million patients were living with congenital heart defects in the United States. Congenital heart defects have the highest hospitalization cost among other birth defect categories. The damage on the U.S economy in 2013 was estimated $6.1 billion. The most complex and severe form of these defects results in single ventricle physiology. Fortunately, over the last 50 years, these patients have been able to survive into adulthood as a result of three stages of surgeries culminating with Fontan operation. …

Piezoceramic-Polymer And Piezoceramic-Cement Composites: A Brief Review, S Inthong, S Eitssayeam, J Tontrakoon, T Tunkasiri

Journal of Metals, Materials and Minerals

The physical properties of piezoceramic-polymers and lead-based or lead-free - Portland cement or geopolymer are described as part of this brief review. The connectivities such as 0-3, 1-3, 2-2 and 3-3 were employed to fabricate the composites. Their physical properties such as dielectric, coupling constant, acoustic impedance etc. were measured. The acoustic impedance obtained from the PZT-epoxy resin (0-3/1-3 connectivity) showed quite low. This can be further developed to match with water or human tissue for both hydrophone and medical applications. The properties of the composites containing leadbased or lead-free cement or geopolymer were also revealed. The results prove that …

Isothermal Aging Of Al-Ni-Sc Alloy Containing Al3ni Microfibers And Al3sc Nanoprecipitates, C Suwanpreecha, J P. Toinin, P Pandee, D C. Dunand, C Limmaneevichitr

Journal of Metals, Materials and Minerals

Binary Al-Sc alloys have excellent strength at room and elevated temperature up to 300°C due to coherent of Al3Sc nanoprecipitates. Binary Al-Ni alloys are an alternative alloy for high-temperature applications owing to high-thermal stability of Al3Ni microfibers. In this study, the hardness evolution at 300°C for up to 672 h for eutectic ternary Al-6Ni-0.4Sc (wt%) was studied and compared with binary Al-0.4Sc and Al-6Ni alloys. The Al-6Ni alloy maintains a constant hardness after aging at 300°C up to 672 h. Both Al-0.4Sc and Al-6Ni-0.4Sc alloys show strong precipitation strengthening response, with peak hardness reached after about 3 h aging, due …

Evaluating The Grinding Process Of Granites Using The Physico-Mechanical And Mineralogical Properties, S Kahraman, M Ucurum, E Yogurtcuoglu, M Fener

Journal of Metals, Materials and Minerals

Granitic rocks are sometimes ground for different purposes. Predicting the mean particle size (d50) is useful for planning and cost estimation of purposes. In order to investigate the possibility of predicting the d50 of ground rock from the physico-mechanical rock properties, six different granites were tested in the laboratory. First, the d50 values were correlated with the corresponding physico-mechanical properties. The simple regression analysis showed that there were no good correlations between the d50 and the physico-mechanical properties. Then, the multiple regression analysis was carried out and strong prediction equations were developed. It was also shown that the dominant parameter …

Optical And Luminescence Investigation Of Er3+ Doped In Na2o-Al2o3-P2o5 Glasses For Photonics Material Application, N Chanthima, N Kiwsakunkran, J Kaewkhao, N Sangwaranatee

Journal of Metals, Materials and Minerals

Optical and photoluminescence properties of Er3+ doped Na2O-Al2O3-P2O5 (NAPEr) glasses were prepared by conventional melt quenching technique at 1200°C. The absorption spectra have 11 peaks corresponded to 4I15/2 ground state to various excited energy levels. The absorption band at 1537 nm shows highest intensity in near-infrared (NIR) region. Also, it can be observed that the intensity of absorption bands increased on increase in concentrations of Er2O3. The Judd-Ofelt (JO) parameters (Ωλ, λ = 2, 4, and 6) are calculated using the absorption bands of the Er2O3 doped glass compositions. McCumber theory has been applied to determine the emission cross-sections (σe) …

Stainless-Steel Column For Robust High Temperature Microchip Gas Chromatography, Abhijit Ghosh, Austin R. Foster, Jacob C. Johnson, Carlos R. Vilorio, Luke T. Tolley, Brian D. Iverson, Aaron R. Hawkins, H. Dennis Tolley, Milton L. Lee

Faculty Publications

This paper reports the first results of a robust, high performance, stainless-steel microchip gas chromatography (GC) column that is capable of analyzing complex real world mixtures as well as operating at very high temperatures. Using a serpentine design, a 10 m column with an approximately semicircular cross section with a 52 µm hydraulic diameter (D_h) was produced in a 17 cm x 6.3 cm x 0.1 cm rectangular steel chip. The channels were produced using a multilayer chemical etch and diffusion bonding process, and metal nuts were brazed onto the inlet and outlet ports allowing for column interfacing …