Engineering Commons^™

Uav Wireless Relay, Paul Kirchoff, Lawrence Ng, David Vieth

Capstone Design Expo Posters

Often a scenario arises in which it is necessary to collection information from a hostile environment and the safest way to do this is the deployment of a small unmanned ground vehicle (UGV). In this situation the UGV will move around the environment while sending a live data stream back to the ground base. However, there can be limits on the maneuverability and range of the UGV making it difficult to complete this mission. To solve this problem unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) are used to assist in both the deployment of the UGV as well as handling the connection between …

Application Intrusion Detection: Security For Cloud Deployments, Justin Murphy, Nick Harrison, John Taylor

Capstone Design Expo Posters

As servers move to the cloud, sources for security analysis become more limited. Security teams must make the most of the resources available to them. Our project attempts to fulfill this need by providing a template-based application to analyze and detect security events in logs that are available in cloud environments. We focus on authentication logs, but analysis modules can be added to flag anomalies in any log.

The deliverables include log analysis, including successive repeated failures, location-based anomalies, and excessive failed login attempts across multiple accounts. To present our findings we output the results to a web interface for …

Structure Of Sheared And Rotating Turbulence: Multiscale Statistics Of Lagrangian And Eulerian Accelerations And Passive Scalar Dynamics, Frank G. Jacobitz, Kai Schneider, Wouter J. T. Bos, Marie Farge

School of Engineering: Faculty Scholarship

The acceleration statistics of sheared and rotating homogeneous turbulence are studied using direct numerical simulation results. The statistical properties of Lagrangian and Eulerian accelerations are considered together with the influence of the rotation to shear ratio, as well as the scale dependence of their statistics. The probability density functions (pdfs) of both Lagrangian and Eulerian accelerations show a strong and similar dependence on the rotation to shear ratio. The variance and flatness of both accelerations are analyzed and the extreme values of the Eulerian acceleration are observed to be above those of the Lagrangian acceleration. For strong rotation it is …

Galvanic Corrosion Of Aluminum/Carbon Composite Systems, Eva Håkansson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Aluminum/carbon composite systems can have outstanding mechanical properties. Aluminum and carbon fiber reinforced polymer matrix composites (CFRP) are typically considered corrosion resistant when used alone, but can develop severe galvanic corrosion when in physical contact in the same component or structure.

General engineering practice is to avoid contact between aluminum and CFRP in any application where moisture may be present, but it is still of great importance to understand the consequences if the two materials accidentally become in contact. There may also be applications where a low rate of galvanic corrosion is acceptable.

This dissertation contributes unique experimental and numerical …

A Novel Extrusion-Based Additive Manufacturing Process For Ceramic Parts, Amir Ghazanfari, Wenbin Li, Ming Leu, Gregory Hilmas

Faculty Publications, Mechanical Engineering

An extrusion-based additive manufacturing process, called the Ceramic On-Demand Extrusion (CODE) process, for producing three-dimensional ceramic components with near theoretical density is introduced in this paper. In this process, an aqueous paste of ceramic particles with a very low binder content (<1 vol%) is extruded through a moving nozzle at room temperature. After a layer is deposited, it is surrounded by oil (to a level just below the top surface of most recent layer) to preclude non-uniform evaporation from the sides. Infrared radiation is then used to partially, and uniformly, dry the just-deposited layer so that the yield stress of the paste increases and the part maintains its shape. The same procedure is repeated for every layer until part fabrication is completed. Several sample parts for various applications were produced using this process and their properties were obtained. The results indicate that the proposed method enables fabrication of large, dense ceramic parts with complex geometries.

Mechanical And Aerospace Engineering, 2015-2016, College Of Engineering And Applied Sciences

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering News

• Letter from the Department Chair
• New Faculty
• Student Success
• University NanoSatellite Program P-Spec Mission
• WALI Student Opportunities
• Study of Blind Cane Vibration

Hybrid Metal Oxide Cycle Water Splitting, Richard B. Diver Jr, Robert D. Palumbo, Nathan P. Siegel, James E. Miller

Other Faculty Research and Publications

Hybrid thermochemical water splitting cycles are provided in which thermally reduced metal oxides particles are used to displace some but not all of the electrical requirements in a water splitting electrolytic cell. In these hybrid cycles, the thermal reduction temperature is significantly reduced compared to two-step metal-oxide thermochemical cycles in which only thermal energy is required to produce hydrogen from water. Also, unlike the conventional higher temperature cycles where the reduction step must be carried out under reduced oxygen pressure, the reduction step in the proposed hybrid cycles can be carried out in air, allowing for thermal input by a …

Design And Development Of The Ebear: A Socially Assistive Robot For Elderly People With Depression, Amirhossein Kargarbideh

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

There has been tremendous progress in the field of robotics in the past decade and especially developing humanoid robots with social abilities that can assist human at a socio-emotional level. The objective of this thesis is to develop and study a perceptive and expressive animal-like robot equipped with artificial intelligence in assisting the elderly people with depression. We investigated how social robots can become companions of elderly individuals with depression and improve their mood and increase their happiness and well-being. The robotic platform built in this thesis is a bear-like robot called the eBear. The eBear can show facial expression …

Design And Development Of An Air Supply System For An Unmanned Circulation Control Aerial Vehicle, Pranith Chander Saka

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Small-scale Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) have been used for decades and are increasing in number and effectiveness as aircraft, sensor and automation technologies mature. Since the demand for UAV platforms capable of performing multiple missions with enhanced performance is increasing, technologies as Circulation Control (CC), which is an active flow control technique that is used to achieve enhanced payload and aerodynamic efficiency, attracts the interest of the research community. This thesis describes the design, development,integration and testing (ground and flight testing) of a CC system capable to provide the required mass flow for a CC-based flight. Performance evaluation is conducted …

Comparison Of Renting Training Aircraft Using Data Envelopment Analysis, Heather Dickerson

Undergraduate Review

Many elements are involved when a pilot is trying to decide which aircraft to pursue for rental. Uninformed new pilots decide to rent purely based upon the aircraft used for initial training, but once more variables are considered, the pilot will realize such an important decision must consider all aspects. Cost typically being the greatest determining factor, horsepower output of the engine, speed, the maximum load capacity, and the maximum altitude the aircraft is able to reach also tend to have a large effect on determining which aircraft will suit the needs of the pilot. Data Envelopment Analysis was used …

Compressed Sensing For Electronic Radio Frequency Receiver: Detection, Sensitivity, And Implementation, Ethan Lin

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

The current state-of the-art for digital receiver bandwidth coverage is now reaching multi-GHz. The conventional wideband digital receiver design is based on the Nyquist information theory, and its bandwidth coverage is limited by the Nyquist sampling rate. Therefore, receiver performance highly depends on the high speed analog-to-digital (ADC) technology and computation hardware such as FPGA. Having proved a fundamental theory that Nyquist waveform can be restored with a reduced sampling rate under certain situations, compressed sensing (CS) technique becomes an attractive solution to wideband digital receiver development.

In this dissertation, performance analysis of the compressed sensing in receiver application is …

Evaluating A New Cem Iii/A Cement For Concretes Exposed To Harsh Acid Rich Environments, David Thompson, Niall Holmes, John Reddy

Conference papers

The Irish Annex to the European specification, performance, production and conformity of concrete, IS EN 206, recommends CEM III/B cement for acid rich environments containing between 66 to 80% GGBS. However, BS 8500, the UK annex to EN 206 and the British Research Establishment (BRE) Special Digest 1, recommends CEM III/A cement with a GGBS range of 36-65%. This project investigated the performance of a new CEM III/A cement produced by Ecocem Ireland in concretes exposed to such environments using an extensive suite of laboratory tests.

In Ireland, up to €5.8bn will be invested to provide fresh drinking water and …

Use Of Forecast Uncertainties In The Power Sector: State-Of-The-Art Of Business Practices, Corinna Möhrlen, Ricardo J. Bessa, Morgane Barthod, Gianni Goretti, Malte Siefert

Conference papers

The work we present is an investigation on the state-of-the-art use of forecast uncertainties in the business practices of actors in the power systems sector that is part of the “IEA Wind Task 36: Wind Power Forecasting”. The purpose of this task is to get an overview of the current use and application of probabilistic forecasts by actors in the power industry and investigate how they estimate and deal with uncertainties. The authors with expertise in probabilistic forecasting have been gathering information from the industry in order to identify the areas, where progress is needed and where it is difficult …

A Method To Calculate Adherence To Inhaled Therapy That Reflects The Changes In Clinical Features Of Asthma, Imran Sulaiman, Jansen Seheult, Elaine Machale, Fiona Boland, Susan M. O’Dwyer, Viliam Rapcan, Shona D’Arcy, Breda Cushen, Matshediso Mokoka, Isabelle Killane, Sheila A. Ryder, Richard B. Reilly, Richard W. Costello

Articles

Electronic monitors are considered the gold standard for objectively quantifying adherence to inhaled therapy (1). Most studies using electronic recording devices have reported adherence as the mean adherence, or the mean daily dose, over the study period (2–4). However, this method does not reflect variations in the way that patients use their treatments. For example, the mean adherence is the same whether an individual took the medication according to the prescribed schedule or took all the doses in the first half of a dosing period, leaving none in the second half. Inhaler technique must …

Ultra-Wideband Radar Based Human Motion Analysis, Zhichong Zhou

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis proposes and investigates two techniques in ultra-wideband (UWB) radar based human motion analysis. The first one is accurate human body landmark detection using UWB radars. The detection is achieved by moving target indication (MTI) and constant false alarm rate detection (CFAR). A new CFAR detection technique is proposed, namely the out-of-band (OB) CFAR detection. In the field experiment, two RF reflective markers are attached to the wrist and elbow of one human arm for reflecting radar signals. It is demonstrated that detection of two markers are feasible and successfully achieved. And our results suggests the OB-CFAR performs better …

Design And Control Of Islanded Microgrid, Zeya Cai

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The control of frequency and power has always been a problem in the development of microgrid. This thesis focuses on the design and control of islanded microgrid; more specifically, it includes the design of the PV system and wind power system and the control of the frequency, voltage and the power output of the islanded microgrid.

Microgrid consists of the power sources, the control system, the distribution network and the load. More specifically, the power sources are composed of PV system and wind turbine system; the control system in the microgrid includes the droop controller, the Maximum Power Point Tracking …

Light Scattering Characterization Of Elastin-Like Polypeptide Trimer Micelles, Ilona Tsuper, Daniel Terrano, Adam Maraschky

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

Elastin-Like Polypeptides (ELP) can be used to form thermo-reversible vehicles for drug delivery systems. The ELP nanoparticles are composed of three-armed star polypeptides. Each of the three arms extending from the negatively charged foldon domain includes 20 repeats of the (GVGVP) amino acid sequence. The ELP polymer chains are soluble at room temperature and become insoluble at the transition temperature (close to 50 oC), forming micelles. The size and shape of the micelle is dependent on the temperature and the pH of solution, along with the concentration of the Phosphate Buffered Saline (PBS) solvent. The technique of Depolarized Dynamic Light …

Design And Fabrication Of A Microfluidic Device Using A 3d Printer, Aaron Smith

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

The goal of this work was to design and implement a microfluidic mixer-based chemical reactor using a 3-D printer. Microfluidic devices are very useful for processes that use expensive reactants or require a high level of control, and we hypothesize that the ability to develop a prototype using a 3-D printer would lower their costs and help overcome some of the limitations of soft-lithography based devices. One-level and two-level designs were made using SolidWorks® software, and various stages of the model were printed on Objet® and FDM® printers. The Objet printer offers the advantage of printing a prototype using a …

Light Scattering Study Of Mixed Micelles Made From Elastin-Like Polypeptide Linear Chains And Trimers, Ilona Tsuper, Daniel Terrano, Adam Maraschky

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

Temperature sensitive nanoparticles (E20F) were generated from a construct of three chains of Elastin- Like Polypeptides (ELP) linked to a negatively charged foldon domain. This ELP system was mixed at different ratios with a single linear chain of ELP (H40L) which was deprived of the foldon domain. The mixed system is soluble at room temperature and at a transition temperature will form swollen micelles with the hydrophobic linear chains hidden inside. This system was studied using Depolarized Dynamic Light Scattering (DDLS) and Static Light Scattering (SLS) to model the size, shape, and internal structure of the mixed micelles. The mixed …

Life Behind Glass: Bioreactor Studies On The Salt-Water Adaptation Of Scenedesmus Dimorphus, Joshua Hartranft, Alex Fedai, Sahar Ataya

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

Algae has considerable promise as source for liquid biofuel because of high productivity and because algae farms do not compete with food crops for arable land. Freshwater algae is preferred over saltwater algae because of the higher lipid content in the former. Unfortunately, freshwater algae “farms” would require a vast amount of fresh water, and given the scarcity of fresh water, this is not a viable long-term solution. Therefore, the adaption of a fresh-water species of algae to a salt-water environment is a potential solution. In this study, it was shown that the growth rate of the freshwater algae S. …

Scalable Assembly Of Nanoparticles Onto Templated Substrates, John Juchnowski

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

Anisotropic nanoparticles, such as carbon nanotubes and noble metal nanorods, have excellent electrical, mechanical, and thermal properties. This work examined techniques for the nanopatterning of silicon substrates for the subsequent deposition of anisotropic nanoparticles in order to exploit their properties in macroscopic applications. Argon-ion-sputter induced rippling of Si (100) as well as a microparticle mask were examined as methods for templating a silicon substrate. For the ion-sputter

Identifying Patterns Of Stress Through Biological Markers, Kristyn Oravec

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

technique, the angle of incidence of the ion beam was 67° from the surface normal,

High-Throughput Assessment Of Developmental Stages Of Nscs Via Promoter-Reporter Assay System Using Recombinant Lentiviruses, Emily Serbinowski, Pranav Joshi, Kyeong Nam Yu, Yana Sichkar

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

Many drugs and chemicals currently available have not been fully evaluated for their toxic effects on the developing brain. Expensive and low-throughput in vivo studies are still being used to evaluate developmental neurotoxicity (DNT). Thus, there is a need to develop an in vitro assay system which is economically feasible and high- throughput. Among various cellular models used for in vitro assay, human neural stem cells (NSCs) are highly desired due to their ability to self-renew and differentiate into neurons, astrocytes and oligodendrocytes. In vitro assessment of developmental stages (proliferation and differentiation) of human NSC is highly important to predict …

Layer-By-Layer Printing Of Alginate For Cancer Cell Migration Assays, Yana Sichar, Alexander Roth, Emily Serbinowski, Kyeong Nam Yu

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

Rapid assessment of the invasion potential of various cancers in three-dimensional (3D) cell culture via layer-by-layer printing of cells encapsulated in hydrogels has been studied. Microarray bioprinting technology on microwell chips has been explored to create 3D cancer-like tissue structures and study cancer cell migration. Alginate, a negatively charged biopolymer, forms hydrogels via ionic crosslinking. Oxy-methacrylated alginate (OMA) is polymerized via near-ultraviolet light in the presence of photoinitiators. Our goal is to demonstrate rapid creation of cancer tissuelike structures via microarray 3D-bioprinting and develop a high-throughput, 3D cancer cell migration assay. To achieve this goal, layer-by-layer cell culture conditions were …

Effect Of Salt Concentration On The Composition Of Elastin-Like Polypeptides In The Condensed Coacervate Phase, Louise L. Beckstrom, Adam Maraschy, Daniel P. Miller

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

Elastin-Like Polypeptides (ELPs) are thermo-responsive polymers which could potentially be used as vehicles for drug delivery. The nanoparticle vehicles are called micelles and the basic structure is made of ELP-foldon. This ELP-foldon has a head group (foldon) that is hydrophilic and three tails (ELP) that are hydrophobic. Above a certain temperature, the transition temperature (Tt), the hydrophobic tails aggregate together to form spheres with the hydrophilic headgroups on the outside. Inside the micelles, linear ELP and drugs can be captured. Although micelles can form without linear ELP, they are bigger when it is present. At lower temperatures the ELPs are …

Explaining Simulator Sickness, Jonathan Cohen

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

Subjects who participate in driving simulation experiments often experience symptoms similar to motion sickness, called “simulator sickness.” However, the exact cause of these symptoms is unknown, which makes it difficult to predict whether a subject will experience them, or to warn them of the likelihood of experiencing those symptoms. A possible relationship between motion sickness and simulator sickness has been conjectured, based on the similarity of the symptoms, but not proven. In this study, we examined whether subjects in CSU simulator experiments who reported a history of motion sickness were more likely to experience the symptoms of simulator sickness. We …

Privacy-Aware Human Tracking Using Kinect And Android Smart Watches, Mudenda Martin Bbela

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

Using the Microsoft Kinect® in conjunction with an Android Wear device, this project aims to design a Privacy Aware 3D motion tracking application with haptic feedback functionality used to reduce prevalence of Back Injuries in Caregivers. The System will use a registration method to ensure the caregiver is both uniquely tracked and abstract from most of the information used by the application.

Characterization Of Aerospike Nozzle Flows, Donald Grimes, Maggie Kolovich, Justin Flaherty, Umesh Balar, Hitarthsinh Chudasama

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

Aerospike nozzles possess many qualities that make them more desirable and efficient than conventional bell-shaped rocket nozzles. Aerospike nozzles have been studied since the 1960s, but problems and limitations with experimentation often led to abandoning further efforts on aerospike nozzles and implementing much more familiar bell-shaped nozzles. In fact, aerospike nozzles have yet to be used in flight—they have only undergone ground testing. The goal of our research is to develop multiple additively manufactured aerospike nozzles and characterize the flow experimentally, numerically, and computationally. Schlieren photography and Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) are used to experimentally characterize the flow, ANSYS CFD …

Gpu Assisted High Performance Rsa Encryption, Zhe Zhao, Alec Mcgrady

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

GPU has become highly popular due to its parallel computing ability. It accelerates operations in large scale. Many applications associate with intensive computations. RSA cryptosystem is one of them that can benefit from its utility. The purpose of this research is to implement RSA encryption and decryption by utilizing GPU to enhance the performance of the process. Since RSA public key and private key operations actually consist of large integer multiplications in a finite field, this research explores the efficient algorithms and implementations of the high performance GPU large integer multiplications. Our work has been implemented on the following three …

Ground Reaction Force Measurement With A Piezoelectric Insole, Mohamad Khattab

Undergraduate Research Posters 2016

The objectives of this research project are to design and build an instrumented shoe to measure the vertical ground reaction force (GRF) associated with a person walking or running. Sensor outputs are calibrated to actual GRF with an artificial neural network. Currently, GRF measurements require special equipment such as force plates or scientific treadmills. A force plate measures GRF over a limited area. A shoe insole fitted with sensors was identified as a good solution that allows free-range walking over arbitrary surfaces. Piezoelectric film sensors were chosen due to their low cost, flexibility and for being self-powered. Eight sensors were …