Engineering Commons^™

Sustainability Children's Book, Linden Cheek

Biological and Agricultural Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

As human driven climate change continues to alter our planet, persuading the general public to adopt sustainable living practices has become increasingly important. Storytelling has long been a part of human culture, and recent studies have emphasized the power of storytelling to influence the audience as a means of changing behavior. This project attempted to teach sustainable principles to primary school children through the creation of a scientific children’s book. The book communicated the maxim of “reduce, reuse, recycle” by tracing a fictitious story of a town where children frequently buy new toys and throw the old toys away. The …

Feasibility For An Improved Method Of Deep Bed In-Bin Grain Drying, Ali Ezell

Biological and Agricultural Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

In-bin grain drying reduces the moisture content of field harvested grain down to a level suitable for profitable storage. The traditional method for in-bin deep bed grain drying is conducted in a cylindrical grain bin with an approximate height to diameter aspect ratio of 1:2, a stirring mechanism, a bottom plenum, a fan, and a heating element. This method poses problems by having a drying front that can move through the grain bed too slowly causing over or under drying leading to losses. This method also requires a stirring mechanism with significant capital costs and the inability to use sensing …

In-Cage Surface Wetting System For Cooling Poultry In Transport, Ryan Clark

Biological and Agricultural Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Abstract

Poultry health and mortality rates are important considerations in poultry production, as companies can minimize product loss and appeal to a consumer base whose concern for animal welfare continues to grow. Although animal welfare is a consideration for the entire poultry production process, this project focuses on the live-haul phase of the process, specifically during transport from grow houses to processing facilities. During the summer months, broiler chickens being transported can suffer from heat stress that can lead to death. This project consists of the designing and testing of an in-cage surface wetting system to minimize heat stress incidents …

Assessing Auto-Flocculation Of Microalgae In Wastewater Treatment, Alexander Parr

Biological and Agricultural Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Biofuels produced from algae have the prospect to provide a cheap, carbon neutral alternative to fossil fuels. However, the high cost for harvesting algae limits its wide application, as the preferred algae strains for biofuel production are typically unicellular microalgae that do not settle in water very well. Recently, researchers have been focusing on developing a biological method to achieve the sedimentation of algae through flocculation. A recent study has concluded that introducing microalgae that self-flocculates increases the recovery of the desired microalgae, similar to the effect of using coagulant to flocculate the algae. This option can potentially be more …

Performance Assessment Of Solid State Anaerobic Digestion Of Poultry Litter, Mason Puckett

Biological and Agricultural Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

The disposal of poultry litter can exert an economic and environmental burden to the agriculture community. As a result, it is desirable to reduce the amount of waste and recover resources from the waste. This study focuses on the construction and preliminary testing of a laboratory scale (20 L) solid state anaerobic digester (AD) fed with dry poultry litter. Glucose was added in addition to the poultry litter to achieve the appropriate C:N ratio to support the growth of anaerobic microorganisms. The AD was first fed every 4 days at 4 g VS/L/feeding for 24 days, rested (no feeding) for …

Chloride Salt Inhibition On Lipid Production In Wastewater-Grown Algae For Biofuel Production, Will Richardson

Biological and Agricultural Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

Algae are increasingly being recognized as useful organisms for many applications in today’s world. Their ability to remove nitrogen, phosphorus, and trace metals from water while adding oxygen to water makes them an attractive tertiary treatment technology in municipal wastewater treatment facilities. At the same time, algae produce lipids and carbohydrates that are useful for biofuel production, and they are not a human food crop unlike many biofuel feedstocks. In this study the effect of increased chloride concentrations in wastewater was assessed on the ability of two species of algae, Chlorella vulgaris and Scenedesmus dimorphus, to function as a …

Automated Control System Design Manual For Plant Growth And Support, Brooke Benham

Biological and Agricultural Engineering Undergraduate Honors Theses

The “Automated Control System Design Manual for Plant Growth and Support” project contains a teaching manual for high school students and teachers to use to aid in teaching STEM subjects. Building confidence in students and encouraging the pursuit of STEM related fields is one of the primary functions. This project utilizes low cost instruments and freely available software to teach the construction, installation, programming, and application for an automated control system with emphasis on plant growth and regulation. The end result is a fully automated system that can be controlled wirelessly via an android application to monitor temperature, humidity, and …

Improving Alternative Fuel Efficiency With Water Injection, Connor Strawn

Honors Theses

Alternative fuel internal combustion engines (ICEs) have been increasing in popularity as the harmful effects of pollution and the need for a sustainable energy source are becoming more apparent. Two alternative fuels, E85 and hydrogen gas, are considered in this study. These fuels are renewable and have less emissions than traditional fuels, but there are many inherent disadvantages to their use. Water injection could alleviate some of the issues that plague these fuels. To test this, a Briggs and Stratton Baja engine was used, with and without water injection. Gasoline with water injection showed better performance than without: the power …

Real-Time Streaming Video And Image Processing On Inexpensive Hardware With Low Latency, Richard L. Gregg

Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

The use of resource constrained inexpensive hardware places restrictions on the design of streaming video and image processing system performance. In order to achieve acceptable frame-per-second (fps) performance with low latency, it is important to understand the response time requirements that the system needs to meet. For humans to be able to process and react to an image there should not be more than a 100ms delay between the time a camera captures an image and subsequently displays that image to the user.

In order to accomplish this goal, several design considerations need to be taken into account that limit …

Positive Experiences As Countermeasures To Stress In Spaceflight: An Investigation Of The Experiences Of Astronauts, Morgan M. Eudy

Theses and Dissertations

Long-duration space mission targets such as asteroids, the Moon and Mars in coming years will increase the need to stress management techniques to support crews on increasingly risky, autonomous missions. New stress management approaches may be found by better understanding the reported positive effects resulting from factors in these environments. This study utilized an exploratory case study approach to leverage quantitative and qualitative data to yield research questions for future correlational analysis. This study found that positive experiences and changes in environmental perspectives occurred from viewing Earth from orbit. Furthermore, this study found that personality factors such as extraversion may …

Characterization And Analysis Of Ultrathin Cigs Films And Solar Cells Deposited By 3-Stage Process, Grace Rajan, Krishna Aryal, Shankar Karki, Puruswottam Aryal, Robert W. Collins, Sylvain Marsillac

Electrical & Computer Engineering Faculty Publications

In view of the large-scale utilization of Cu(In,Ga)Se₂ (CIGS) solar cells for photovoltaic application, it is of interest not only to enhance the conversion efficiency but also to reduce the thickness of the CIGS absorber layer in order to reduce the cost and improve the solar cell manufacturing throughput. In situ and real-time spectroscopic ellipsometry (RTSE) has been used conjointly with ex situ characterizations to understand the properties of ultrathin CIGS films. This enables monitoring the growth process, analyzing the optical properties of the CIGS films during deposition, and extracting composition, film thickness, grain size, and surface roughness which …

Spanish Language Topics Course With An Emphasis On Construction Safety, Austin Changras

Construction Management

The end goal of this research-based project is to evaluate whether a Spanish course with an emphasis on construction site safety would be beneficial to Cal Poly’s Construction Management (CM) program and how it might also benefit the industry. The research orchestrated will be to decipher whether or not there is even a need for this type of class to be included into the curriculum. Along with data research, two separate surveys have been conducted, one administered to the Construction Management student population and the other to industry professionals. Furthermore, George Healy, a fellow CM student, is working on the …

Implementing Bim Management And Process Optimization Tools In Construction Management Curriculum, Jake W. Castillo

Construction Management

As the construction industry rapidly continues to adopt technology and Building Information Modeling practices, we need to ensure that Construction Management curriculum prepares students for what is expected after graduation. Cal Poly’s Construction Management program currently have two Building Information Modeling courses in the curriculum that focus mainly on learning software and while this will be essential for students graduating the Construction Management program, there remains room to improve the courses as the industry adapts. Adding curriculum geared more toward managing the BIM process and learning process optimization skills will not only benefit a higher percentage of students, but will …

Using The Soar Approach To Teach Middle School Students About Math And Science Concepts Found In Engineering, Rachael A. Wagner

Honors Program: Senior Projects (Public)

In order to address the lack of knowledge about the engineering profession in middle-level students, the project described in this Honors Thesis was developed. Through the creation of an afterschool program centered on engineering, students were able to apply the math and science concepts covered to design, build, and test a bridge. One particular lesson from this after-school program was highlighted in this thesis, the lesson covering the Pythagorean Theorem, to demonstrate the use of SOAR methodology in the lesson’s development and later use in the classroom. The effectiveness of the Pythagorean Theorem lesson was evaluated positively based on the …

Road Diet Feasibility Analysis For Nebraska, Brandon L. Purintun

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

Many rural towns and cities throughout Nebraska have experienced consistent population decline over the past 50 years, and the highway system once built to accommodate hoped-for growth is not serving the population as well as it could. These towns and cities would benefit from implementing a road diet conversion on their main highways. Within rural communities, road diets are an increasingly popular method of improving safety along major arterials through the reduction of excess capacity in favor of increasing refuge areas for turning vehicles. A typical application might be the restriping of a four-lane undivided highway into a three-lane highway …

Examination Of Steel Pin And Hanger Assembly Performance: Retrofit To Replacement, Chandana Chickamagalur Balakrishna

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

A number of steel, multi-beam bridges exist in the United States that contain pin and hanger assemblies. Pin and hanger assemblies are fracture critical members whose failure would result in collapse of the bridge or render it unable to perform its expected functions. As these bridges continue to age, many assemblies have deteriorated to a point where retrofit or replacement has to be considered and performed to maintain intended safety and performance. States have taken various approaches to address the pin and hanger assembly retrofit and replacement options. However, there is no single document that summarizes these approaches.

This research …

Optimized Health Monitoring Plans For A Steel, Double-Track Railway Bridge, Ahmed Rageh

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

Railway bridges are an essential component of any modern society and play a significant transportation role. During the 19^th and early 20^th centuries steel truss and plate girder bridges were commonly used railway designs, with most of the trusses constructed using pin and eyebar systems and most other load carrying members being riveted, built-up sections.

Many of these bridges are still in use and are subjected to increased railway traffic intensity, loads and speeds. The current practice for evaluating the integrity of bridges in the United States, irrespective of use, is primarily via visual inspection, with those inspections …

Peridynamic Modeling Of Dynamic Fracture In Bio-Inspired Structures For High Velocity Impacts, Sneha Akula

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

Bio-inspired damage resistant models have distinct patterns like brick-mortar, Voronoi, helicoidal etc., which show exceptional damage mitigation against high-velocity impacts. These unique patterns increase damage resistance (in some cases up to 3000 times more than the constituent materials) by effectively dispersing the stress waves produced by the impact. Ability to mimic these structures on a larger scale can be ground-breaking and could be used in numerous applications. Advancements in 3D printing have now made possible fabrication of these patterns with ease and at a low cost. Research on dynamic fracture in bio-inspired structures is very limited but it is …

Essays On Applications Of Transportation Network Design And Optimization, Amirali Ghaharikermani

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this dissertation, we address different transportation problems. The three main outcomes are: designing a battery swap station network, studying gaps in Empty Container Management literature, designing a model with similar characteristics to the vehicle routing problem as well as implementation scenario for it to be applied for a real-world case.

For the designed battery swap station, a model is developed for customer demand satisfaction that permits construction of different types of BSS in the planning network. Our solution methodology is a Tabu Search algorithm combined with a dynamic programming initialization. Numerous tests showed that the proposed TS approach provides …

Demonstrating Set-Based Design Techniques- A Uav Case Study, Colin Small

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Department of Defense (DoD) and Engineered Resilient Systems (ERS) community seek to improve decision making in the Analysis of Alternatives (AoA) process by incorporating resilience and leveraging the capabilities of model-based engineering (MBE) early in the design process. Traditional tradespace exploration utilizing Point-Based Design (PBD) often converges quickly on a solution with subsequent engineering changes to modify the design. However, this process can lead to a suboptimal solution if an incorrect initial solution is chosen. Enabled by MBE, Set-Based Design (SBD) considers sets of all possible solutions and enables down-selecting possibilities to converge on a final solution. Using a …

Investigation Of Nanomaterial Based Photovoltaic Panel Packaging Materials, Xingeng Yang

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

In this research, nanomaterial-based packaging materials for photovoltaic (PV) panels are investigated. A hydrophobic/anti-reflective surface coating which not only repels water from the top glass of a PV panel but at the same time reduces its light reflectance is investigated. COMSOL simulation results indicate that taller ellipsoid rod (aspect ratio = 5) reflects less light than shorter rod (aspect ratio = 0.5) in the desired spectrum for solar energy harvest from 400nm-700nm. The addition of a polymer layer on these ellipsoid rods broadens the light incident angle from 23° to 34°, from which light can be efficiently absorbed. Based on …

Low Latency Intrusion Detection In Smart Grids, Israel Zairi Akingeneye

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The transformation of traditional power grids into smart grids has seen more new technologies such as communication networks and smart meters (sensors) being integrated into the physical infrastructure of the power grids. However, these technologies pose new vulnerabilities to the cybersecurity of power grids as malicious attacks can be launched by adversaries to attack the smart meters and modify the measurement data collected by these meters. If not timely detected and removed, these attacks may lead to inaccurate system state estimation, which is critical to the system operators for control decisions such as economic dispatch and other related functions.

This …

Application Of Modular Multilevel Converters (Mmc) Using Phase-Shifted Pwm And Selective Harmonic Elimination In Distribution Systems, Thouhidul Islam

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Reducing the size and weight of a power electric system is a prodigious challenge to researchers as the development of the latest technologies emerge in the field of electrical engineering. A similar urge is there to develop a light-weight mobile power substation (MPS) to use in the electric power distribution systems during emergency conditions. This thesis proposes a power electronics based solution using the modular multilevel converter (MMC) topology to design the MPS system. The market-available power semiconductor devices are analyzed and suitable devices are selected to design the system. The phase-shifted pulse width modulation (PS-PWM) and selective harmonic elimination …

Convergent Set-Based Design In Integrated Analysis Of Alternatives: Designing Engineered Resilient Systems, Zephan Wright Wade

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This thesis presents a comprehensive package for understanding and expanding set-based design quantification through the definition and demonstration of Convergent set-based design (SBD). Convergent SBD is a technique developed for the Engineered Resilient Systems program sponsored by the Department of Defense. Convergent SBD contributes a repeatable methodology with the goal of mathematically eliminating inefficient sets. The study of Convergent SBD led to the development of dominance identification criteria equations using comparison of statistical means. The demonstration of Convergent SBD also illustrates the effect of mission resilience in the tradespace and the impact mission resilience has on preference. Finally, Convergent SBD …

Fabrication And Characterization Of Graphene Based 2d Materials For Supercapacitors, Anishkumar Manoharan

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Supercapacitors have attracted a lot attention due to their efficient energy storage. In comparison to batteries, supercapacitors have high capacitance, energy, and power densities per unit mass than conventional capacitors. Carbon based materials are most promising in supercapacitor application due to their outstanding physical and electrochemical behavior. In this work, a facile method to synthesize a nanocomposite electrode consisting of annealed carbon from carbon ink and MoS2 was demonstrated. Effects of various aqueous and solid electrolytes were studied. It was found that the nanocomposite electrode with 10% MoS2 and 1M Na2SO4 as the aqueous electrolyte tested using the three electrode …

Gating Methods For High-Voltage Silicon Carbide Power Mosfets, Audrey Dearien

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The objective of this thesis is to assess the challenges associated with driving Silicon Carbide (SiC) power devices, and to compare the potential gate drive methods for these devices which address those challenges. SiC power devices present many benefits that make them suitable for next generation automotive, power utility grid, and energy management applications. High efficiency, increased power density, and reliability at high-temperatures are some of the main benefits of SiC technology. However, the many challenges associated with these devices have prevented their adoption into industry applications. The argument is made in this thesis that the gate driver is a …

Analyzing Requirements And Traceability Information To Improve Bug Localization, Michael Rath, David Lo, Patrick Mader

Research Collection School Of Computing and Information Systems

Locating bugs in industry-size software systems is time consuming and challenging. An automated approach for assisting the process of tracing from bug descriptions to relevant source code benefits developers. A large body of previous work aims to address this problem and demonstrates considerable achievements. Most existing approaches focus on the key challenge of improving techniques based on textual similarity to identify relevant files. However, there exists a lexical gap between the natural language used to formulate bug reports and the formal source code and its comments. To bridge this gap, state-of-the-art approaches contain a component for analyzing bug history information …

Optimization Of Chemical Kinetic Mechanism For Efficient Computation Of Combustion Process In Advanced Internal Combustion Engine Configurations, Muzammil Arshad

Theses and Dissertations

For the development and optimization of future fuels and automotive engines, computer modeling and simulation has proved itself as an inseparable, efficient and cost effective tool to experimental studies. The traditional reliance of computer models on simplified global reaction steps to simulate the combustion and engine performance parameters, such as in-cylinder pressure, heat release rate and pollutant formation could reduce credibility of the predictions as the global reaction steps depend on arbitrary adjustment of model parameters. This study has incorporated detailed chemistry by augmenting the combustion model of a three dimensional unsteady compressible turbulent Navier-Stokes solver with liquid spray injection …

Mechatronic Carnival, Caroline Kutach, Charlotte Liu, Nic Rodriguez, Laura Wilson

Mechatronics Final Projects

The goal for our design was to create a two-player water gun shooting game. The object of the game is to use a water gun to aim a stream of water at a target and fill up a tank. The player who is able to successfully fill up their tank first is the winner.

The design consists of two water guns that are powered by a pump. They are used to shoot at a target in the backboard of the device. As the tank fills up, LEDs light up to indicate each player’s progress. When a tank is full, all …

Variable Input Pressure Regulator, Sean Farrell, Dupri Grimes, William Mcelvogue, Nathan Richter

Mechatronics Final Projects

The variable input pressure regulation system was designed to carry out a test in accordance with the ASTM E1105 standardized commercial window testing procedure. This testing standard dictates that a negative pressure must be maintained within 2% of a constant value while a curtain wall spray system saturates the window from the outside. The test lasts around 15 - 20 minutes depending on the window type, though it may last longer if the user chooses. Currently, the test is performed by a user regulating differential pressure with a variable pump power dial, a gate valve, and a high precision liquid …