Engineering Commons^™

Desorption Of Trace Inorganic Contaminants From Solids In Drinking Water Distribution Systems, Tiana W. Hammer

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

In order to maintain high quality safe drinking water, we need to understand what happens after the water has been cleaned at the drinking water plant and before it gets to the consumer’s house. Even if low concentrations of toxic contaminants enter the drinking water distribution system (DWDS) there is potential for contaminants to accumulate and be released by changes in flow or water conditions in high concentrations at the tap. For this study, we collected solid material from Park City, Utah that accumulated within the DWDS, along with a year of monthly monitoring of the DWDS. These solids were …

Importance Of Exposure Time On Digital Image Correlation (Dic) At Extreme Temperatures, Thinh Quang Thai

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Extreme temperatures have increasingly played an important role in engineering applications, including leading edges during hypersonic flight, spacecraft re-entry, and propulsion systems. In order to design for such thermo-mechanical conditions, materials must be characterized using suitable measurement methods. DIC is a popular and versatile method in full-field measurement. In brief, DIC compares images of a sample between its undeformed and deformed state in order to get displacement and strain field maps. Since the images are acquired from digital cameras, it is important to have high contrast images for meaningful correlation. Exposure time is a pivotal camera setting relating to camera …

Assessment Of The Evolving Low-Cost Business Model For The Future Importance Of U.S. Secondary Airports, Nurettin Dinler

Theses and Dissertations

Airline deregulation caused a profound reshape in the aviation industry. The liberalization of the aviation sector resulted in a favorable environment for the emergence of low-cost carriers (LCCs). Following deregulation, airlines saw many attempts at their business strategies to gain more passengers in air transportation market. To capture additional market shares of passenger traffic, the business models of LCCs have evolved to mirror the more common business models employed by the traditional legacy airlines. The purpose of this study was to examine what effect, if any, exists between LCCs’ market share of passenger enplanements at secondary airports and their business …

Development Of Recyclability Index: A Design For Assembly And Disassembly Approach, Darshan Yadav

Theses and Dissertations

Designing products for recyclability is driven by environmental and economic goals. Several Design for Assembly(DFA) rules and parameters can be used to gauge the recyclability index of product designs. These indices can be used for comparative analysis of the recyclability of different products. This assists the designer in making design choices related to the product’s end of life. However, many of the existing recyclability indices are only available after design and manufacturing decisions are made. If such design decisions could be made earlier in the design process, when the design space is less bound, recyclability could be considered earlier. A …

Pollen Grains Recognition Based On Computer Vision Methods, Amar Idrees Daood

Theses and Dissertations

The classification of pollen grains is a main task in many disciplines including ecology, forensic sciences, allergy control, and oil exploration. In these application areas, visual inspection is the common method used for classifying pollen. However, recognition by visual inspection consumes much time and effort. Even though some level of automation exists, the automatic recognition of pollen grains remains an open problem. Current pollen-classification solutions rely on measurements of visual cues such as contour or texture. However, these features do not capture the visual complexity of information needed for discriminating among various species of pollen, especially when both a large-scale …

Speech Emotion Recognition Using Connectionist Models In A Tandem System, Mary Najafi

Theses and Dissertations

This article presents a tandem Speech Emotion Recognition (SER) system by which 8 archetypal emotions can be differentiated based upon two different types of acoustic features as inputs to Artificial Neural Network (ANN) models. The two types of features that are fed into the classifiers reveal the degree of excitement and pleasentness of speech. The author has implied the time-based characteristics of speech in the feature extraction method by monitoring the trend of local features through time. Thus, two global features are proposed that are derived from Teager Energy Operator (TEO)-based (T EOg) and spectral features, Mel-Frequency Cepstral Coeffcients (MF …

Infrared Resonant-Coupled Metamaterial Sensing And Phonon-Polariton-Enhanced Infrared Interconnects, Michael Francis Finch

Theses and Dissertations

Coupled-mode theory has been applied to various fields of endeavor from waveguide splitters/combiners and molecular sensing to light-matter interactions. Metamaterials, engineered periodic or aperiodic structures, are employed to sense molecular vibrational fingerprints in the mid to long infrared wavelengths. A metasurface, a 2D metamaterial, can be designed such that it has a resonance at a molecular vibrational frequency. Mode splitting results from the coupling of two electromagnetic field distributions, or modes, spatially and/or temporally. Metamaterial and molecular resonance coupling is a result of near field interaction. Fano resonances have an asymmetric line-shape that results from the coupling of a continuum …

Simulation Based Cost-Benefit Analysis For The Inspection Of Highway Bridges Using Small Unmanned Aerial Systems, Rashmi Kadamkulangara Balagopalan

Theses and Dissertations

Visual inspections remain significantly important in surveying the present decay and deterioration status of bridge inspections. These inspections are critical to conduct patch-up remedies and maintenance assignments to guarantee the continued serviceability of structures. Given the high inventory of bridges nationwide (over of 600,000 bridges), increasing costs of bridge inspections are becoming a concern for departments of transportation (DOTs). The conventional inspection method is costly due to various factors. For example, the current approach often requires specialized equipment (e.g., bucket trucks) to conduct underside bridge inspections that significantly affect safety levels on the field and overall costs, and inspectors need …

Evaluating Water Filtration And Disinfection For Household, Using Slow Sand Filters Plus Solar Disinfection, Mariana Demitry

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

In this research, a household water treatment system was built and evaluated as a trial for improving the drinking water quality of the Nile River for the low-income communities. The system consisted of household-scale slow sand filters, and transparent polyethylene terephthalate-bottles for solar disinfection. The evaluation of the system depended on the removal/inactivation of some surrogates for the reference pathogens, and turbidity. The reference pathogens are pathogens specified by the World Health Organization to evaluate the efficiency of the household water treatment options. They were chosen to represent the classes of pathogens in water (bacteria, viruses, protozoa). The surrogates used …

Evaluating The Impact Of External Carbon Source In Laboratory-Based Denitrification Rate Experiments, Jared Richens

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Limitations in the quality of transformation rates used with water quality models such as QUAL2K have led to the need to identify methods that can effectively and accurately determine these rates. During the early stages of method development of a Utah Department of Environmental Quality (Utah DEQ) funded project seeking to identify such methods, it was determined that under certain situations external carbon amendment may be required to successfully determine denitrification rates.

The focus of this study was to evaluate the potential impacts that introducing external carbon sources may have on estimating the laboratory denitrification rates resulting from these methods. …

Advancing The Implementation Of Hydrologic Models As Web-Based Applications, Prasanna Dahal

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Deeper understanding of relationships between flow in river sand various hydrologic elements such as rainfall, land use, and soil type is imperative to solve water related problems like droughts and floods. Advanced computer models are becoming essential in helping us understand such relationships. However, preparing such models requires huge investment of time and resources, much of which are concentrated on acquisition and curation of data. This work introduces agree and open source web Application (web App) that provides researchers with simplified access to hydrological data and modeling functionality. The web App helps in the creation of both hydrologic models, and …

Size-Scale Effects Of Nonlinear Weir Hydraulics, Nathan L. Young

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Experimental physical model studies of hydraulic structures are often conducted to replicate flow behavior that may occur at the prototype scale. Geometric similitude is most often maintained between the prototype and model when studying reservoir and open channel hydraulic structures to account for the dominant gravity and inertia forces while other fluid forces (e.g., viscosity,surface tension) are assumed negligible. However, as model size and/or upstream head decreases, other fluid forces can exceed the negligible level and influence model flow behavior. This phenomenon is referred to as size-scale effects and is one potential origin of error in predicting the prototype behavior …

Simulation And Optimization Models To Evaluate Performance Of Aquifer Storage And Recovery Wells In Fresh Water Aquifers, Ali Forghani

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Aquifer storage and recovery (ASR) involves artificially recharging an aquifer through well(s) using surplus water for later recovery in high-demand months. The operators of the studied ASR system developed the system as a means of receiving additional water rights to supplement their pre-existing water rights for extraction in dry months. However, the region’s water regulators define the performance of this ASR system as the amount of the injected water that is recoverable from the same wells during extraction periods. The study proposes recovery effectiveness (REN) as the performance index of this ASR system. REN equals the injectate proportion that the …

Evaluation Of A Side-By-Side Full-Scale Biofiltration Conversion In A Nutrient-Limited Environment, Stetson S. Bassett

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

In order to meet increasing water demands and more stringent regulations drinking water treatment plant managers must continually look to new treatment strategies and optimization techniques. One such strategy is to eliminate chlorine residual before filtration, allowing indigenous bacteria already present in the source water to grow on the filter media. These microorganisms help improve effluent water quality by increasing organic and inorganic contaminant removal. The process is known as biological filtration, or biofiltration. The implications of converting a conventional filtration plant (not specifically designed for biofiltration) to a biofiltration plant are still not well understood. Therefore, the purpose of …

Modular, Scalable Battery Systems With Integrated Cell Balancing And Dc Bus Power Processing, Muhammad Muneeb Ur Rehman

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Traditional electric vehicle and stationary battery systems use series-connected battery packs that employ centralized battery management and power processing architecture. Though, these systems meet the basic safety and power requirements with a simple hard- ware structure, the approach results in a battery pack that is energy and power limited by weak cells throughout life and most importantly at end-of-life. The applications of battery systems can benefit significantly from modular, scalable battery systems capable of advanced cell balancing, efficient power processing, and cost gains via reuse beyond first-use application. The design of modular battery systems has unique requirements for the power …

Thermal Removal Of Carbon Dioxide From The Atmosphere: Energy Requirements And Scaling Issues, Ted Von Hippel

Publications

I conduct a systems-level study of direct air capture of CO2 using techniques from thermal physics. This system relies on a combination of an efficient heat exchanger, radiative cooling, and refrigeration, all at industrial scale and operated in environments at low ambient temperatures. While technological developments will be required for such a system to operate efficiently, those developments rest on a long history of refrigeration expertise and technology, and they can be developed and tested at modest scale. I estimate that the energy required to remove CO2 via this approach is comparable to direct air capture by other techniques. The …

Wisdom Of Artificial Crowds Feature Selection In Untargeted Metabolomics: An Application To The Development Of A Blood-Based Diagnostic Test For Thrombotic Myocardial Infarction, Patrick J. Trainor, Roman V. Yampolskiy, Andrew P. Defilippis

Faculty and Staff Scholarship

Introduction: Heart disease remains a leading cause of global mortality. While acute myocardial infarction (colloquially: heart attack), has multiple proximate causes, proximate etiology cannot be determined by a blood-based diagnostic test. We enrolled a suitable patient cohort and conducted a non-targeted quantification of plasma metabolites by mass spectrometry for developing a test that can differentiate between thrombotic MI, non-thrombotic MI, and stable disease. A significant challenge in developing such a diagnostic test is solving the NP-hard problem of feature selection for constructing an optimal statistical classifier. Objective: We employed a Wisdom of Artificial Crowds (WoAC) strategy for solving the feature …

Protection, Automation, And Frequency Stability Analysis Of A Laboratory Microgrid System, Christopher Eric Osborn

Master's Theses

Due to increasing changes in the power industry, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo's electrical engineering department introduced a set of initiatives to adequately equip students with the skills and knowledge to interact with new technologies. Specifically, the department proposed a microgrid and power systems protection and automation laboratory to strengthen students' knowledge of microprocessor-based relays. This paper outlines a microgrid laboratory system that fulfills the initiative's goal and proposes a collection of laboratory experiments for inclusion in a new laboratory course at Cal Poly. The experiments provide students with practical experience using Schweitzer Engineering Laboratory (SEL) relays and teach fundamental …

Protection Against Ungrounded Single Phase Open Circuit Faults In 3-Phase Distribution Transformers, Higinio Ariel Montoya

Master's Theses

This thesis explores the impacts and behavior of 3-phase distribution transformers when subject to ungrounded single phase open circuit faults. A simple 3-phase system is modeled using MATLAB Simulink and operation under fault conditions are simulated and studied. Simulation results are confirmed via lab experimentation. Finally, a robust detection and protection method using neutral current injection (as proposed in industry literature) is built and demonstrated.

Electric utility operating experience has demonstrated that all too often, loads on 3-phase distribution transformers are not adequately protected against an ungrounded single phase open circuit fault (commonly called “single phasing”). This type of fault …

Knee Angles And Axes Crosstalk Correction In Gait, Cycling, And Elliptical Training Exercises, Jordan M. Skaro

Master's Theses

When conducting motion analysis using 3-dimensional motion capture technology, errors in marker placement on the knee results in a widely observed phenomenon known as “crosstalk” [1-18] in calculated knee joint angles (i.e., flexion-extension (FE), adduction-abduction (AA), internal-external rotation (IE)). Principal Component Analysis (PCA) has recently been proposed as a post hoc method to reduce crosstalk errors and operates by minimizing the correlation between the knee angles [1, 2]. However, recent studies that have used PCA have neither considered exercises, such as cycling (C) and elliptical training (E), other than gait (G) nor estimated the corrected knee axes following PCA correction. …

Remote Vibration Estimation Using Displaced-Phase-Center Antenna Sar For Strong Clutter Environments, Justin B. Campbell, Francisco Pérez, Qi Wang, Balasubramaniam Santhanam, Ralf Dunkel, Armin W. Doerry, Thomas Atwood, Majeed M. Hayat

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research and Publications

It has been previously demonstrated that it is possible to perform remote vibrometry using synthetic aperture radar (SAR) in conjunction with the discrete fractional Fourier transform (DFrFT). Specifically, the DFrFT estimates the chirp parameters (related to the instantaneous acceleration of a vibrating object) of a slow-time signal associated with the SAR image. However, ground clutter surrounding a vibrating object introduces uncertainties in the estimate of the chirp parameter retrieved via the DFrFT method. To overcome this shortcoming, various techniques based on subspace decomposition of the SAR slow-time signal have been developed. Nonetheless, the effectiveness of these techniques is limited to …

The Natural Aging Effect On Hardenability In Al-Mg-Si: A Complex Interaction Between Composition And Heat Treatment Parameters, Alex Poznak, Violet Thole, Paul G. Sanders

Michigan Tech Publications, Part 1

The technological relevance of Al-Mg-Si alloys has been rapidly growing over the last decade. Of particular interest to current and future applications is the problematic negative effect of prior natural aging on subsequent artificial age hardening. The influence of natural aging is dependent on both processing and compositional variables and has origins that are far from well-understood. This work examines the hardenability of 6000 series alloys under a wide range of conditions, paying particular attention to the natural aging effect. Experimental variables include alloy composition (Mg + Si, Mg/Si), cooling rate after solutionization, and duration of prior natural aging. Hardenability …

Development Of Scalable Simulator For Spiking Neural Network, Jae Sang Ha

McKelvey School of Engineering Graduate Student Theses & Dissertations

A neural network simulator for Spiking Neural Network (SNN) is a useful research tool to model brain functions with a computer. With this tool, different parameters can be explored easily compared to using a real brain. For several decades, researchers have developed many software packages and simulators to accelerate research in computational neuroscience. However, despite their advantages, different neural simulators possess different limitations, such as flexibility of choosing different neuron models and scalability of simulators for large numbers of neurons. This paper demonstrates an efficient and scalable spiking neural simulator that is based on growth transform neurons and runs on …

Superhydrophobic, Carbon-Infiltrated Carbon Nanotubes On Si And 316l Stainless Steel With Tunable Geometry, Kimberly A. Stevens, Christian D. Esplin, Taylor M. Davis, D. Jacob Butterfield, Philip S. Ng, Anton E. Bowden, Brian D. Jensen, Brian D. Iverson

Faculty Publications

Use of carbon nanotubes to create superhydrophobic coatings has been considered due to their ability to offer a relatively uniform nanostructure. However, carbon nanotubes (CNTs) may be considered delicate with a typical diameter of tens of nanometers for a multi‐walled CNT; as‐grown carbon nanotubes often require the addition of a thin‐film hydrophobic coating to render them superhydrophobic. Furthermore, fine control over the diameter of the as‐grown CNTs, or overall nanostructure is difficult. This work demonstrates the utility of using carbon infiltration to layer amorphous carbon on multi‐walled nanotubes to improve structural integrity and achieve superhydrophobic behavior with tunable geometry. These …

The Implementation Of Opportunistic Multiple Spacecraft Per Antenna Concepts On The Msu-Sta Deep Space Station 17, Murphy C. Stratton

Morehead State Theses and Dissertations

A thesis presented to the faculty of the College of Science, Morehead State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree Master of Science by Murphy C. Stratton on April 30, 2018.

Thermal Freetop: A Free Open-Source Spacecraft Thermal Analysis Software Package, Yu Tso

Morehead State Theses and Dissertations

A thesis presented to the faculty of the College of Science Morehead State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree Master of Science by Yu Tso on April 30, 2018.

Investigation Of Deep Neural Network Image Processing For Cubesat Size Satellites, Adam D. Braun

Morehead State Theses and Dissertations

A thesis presented to the faculty of the College of Science at Morehead State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree Master of Science by Adam D. Braun on April 30, 2018.

Hydrothermal Pre-Treatment Process Of Phosphogypsum For Enhanced Rare Earths Recovery, Volha Yahorava, Eugene Lakay, Wilma Clark

Beneficiation of Phosphates VIII

Phosphogypsum (PG) is an industrial waste of phosphoric acid (H₃PO₄) production from phosphate ore by sulphuric acid (H₂SO₄) digestion, commonly known as the “wet acid” process. Phosphate rock often contains some valuable rare earth elements (REE) and it is well-established that from 70% to 85% of REE originally present in the phosphate rock end up in the PG, with an average REE content of ~0.4 wt. % [1-4]. PG is considered to be an attractive secondary resource of REE. However, processes available currently for REE recovery are often very expensive, sometimes impractical, …

Surface Chemistry And Flotation Behavior Of Monazite, Apatite, Ilmenite, Quartz, Rutile, And Zircon With Octanohydroxamic Acid, Corby Anderson, Josue Mushidi

Beneficiation of Phosphates VIII

Global increase in rare earth demand and consumption has led to a further understanding of their beneficiation and recovery. Monazite is the second most important rare earth mineral that can be further exploited. In this study, the surface chemistry of monazite in terms of zeta potential, adsorption density, and flotation response by microflotation using octanohydroxamic acid is determined. Apatite, ilmenite, quartz, rutile, and zircon are minerals that frequently occur with monazite among other minerals, hence were chosen as gangue minerals in this study. The Iso Electric Point (IEP) of monazite, apatite, ilmenite, quartz, rutile, and zircon are 5.3, 8.7, 3.8, …

Program Progress Performance Report #2, Missouri University Of Science And Technology. Inspire - University Transportation Center

Semi-Annual Progress Reports

No abstract provided.