Operations Research, Systems Engineering and Industrial Engineering Commons^™

Using Simulation To Model The Army Recruiting Station With Multi-Quality Prospects, Edward L. Mclarney

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis explores the application of simulation to the Army Recruiting Station. Included are the effects of leadership styles and policies, the effects of recruiters with different personality types, and differences in processing for varying types of recruits. Research included heavy emphasis into determining the effects of leadership on recruiter productivity. In addition, major changes were made to a previous simulation model. The changes allowed current research to be implemented into the simulation. This research is intended to help the United States Army Recruiting Command better understand how changes in the recruiting process and in leadership policies affect productivity.

Selection Of Psychophysiological Features Across Subjects For Classifying Workload Using Artificial Neural Networks, Trevor I. Laine

Theses and Dissertations

The issue of pilot workload is important to the United States Air Force because pilot overload or task saturation leads to decreases in mission effectiveness. Additionally, in the most extreme cases, pilot overload may lead to the loss of aircraft and crewmember lives. Current research efforts are utilizing psychophysiological data including electroencephalography (EEG), cardiac, eye-blink, and respiration measures in an attempt to identify workload levels. The primary focus of this effort is to determine if a single parsimonious set of psychophysiological features exists for accurately classifying workload levels between multiple test subjects. To accomplish this objective, the signal-to-noise (SNR) saliency …

Dynamic Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (Uav) Routing With A Java-Encoded Reactive Tabu Search Metaheuristic, Kevin P. O'Rourke

Theses and Dissertations

In this paper we consider the dynamic routing of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) currently in operational use with the US Air Force. Dynamic vehicle routing problems (VRP) have always been challenging, and the airborne version of the VRP adds dimensions and difficulties not present in typical ground-based applications. Previous UAV routing work has focused on primarily on static, pre-planned situations; however, scheduling military operations, which are often ad-hoc, drives the need for a dynamic route solver that can respond to rapidly evolving problem constraints. With these considerations in mind, we examine the use of a Java-encoded metaheuristic to solve these …

Solving The Multidimensional Multiple Knapsack Problem With Packing Constraints Using Tabu Search, Jonathan M. Romaine

Theses and Dissertations

This paper presents a methodology for solving military aircraft load-scheduling problems modeled as a multidimensional multiple knapsack problem, Because of the computational time associated with applying conventional algorithms to this type of problem, we employ tabu search to determine how much cargo a heterogeneous group of aircraft can carry. This study extends the previous work of Chocolaad in two areas. First, we modify Chocolaad's algorithms to solve the multiple (rather than the single) knapsack problem under the constraints he defined for the Airlift Loading Problem. Second, we drop his assumption of a homogeneous group of aircraft. We validate our model …

A Value Focused Approach To Determining The Top Ten Hazards In Army Aviation, Brian K. Sperling

Theses and Dissertations

The United States Army Safety Center is challenged with identifying the top ten most severe hazards in Army Aviation. This research utilizes value-focused thinking and multiattribute preference theory concepts to produce a decision analysis model designed to aid decision-makers in their analysis process. The severity model is based on the Army's Risk Management doctrinal manual and has been tailored specifically for aviation related accidents and hazards. The model determines the severity and risk ranking for 65 categories of accidents and 24 existing hazards. A sensitivity analysis is conducted to examine the effects of variations in the weights of the top-level …

An Evaluation And Comparison Of The Ace And Brace Airfield Models, David W. Wiliams

Theses and Dissertations

Airfields are a critical aspect of our military's ability to project power or respond to crises throughout the world. It is crucial that mobility planners have an effective means to estimate the capacity of these airfields. The objective of this research is to examine common mobility metrics and evaluate existing means of measuring them. Currently, Air Mobility Command has two models, the Airfield Capacity Estimator (ACE) and the Base Resource and Capabilities Estimator (BRACE), that were designed to estimate the resource requirements and capacities of an airfield. This study offers a critical evaluation and comparison of the two models. Discrepancies …

Technology Selection For The Air Force Research Laboratory Air Vehicles Directorate: An Analysis Using Value Focused Thinking, Michael F. Winthrop

Theses and Dissertations

A technology selection model was developed for the Air Vehicles Directorate of Air Force Research Laboratory. The model was developed and demonstrated to aid in addressing the question of what technologies Air Vehicles' should invest in to remain consistent with Air Force values. Both Value-Focused Thinking and optimization approaches were used to identify the value of Air Vehicles technology, to provide insights to Air Vehicles' decision-makers, to determine where value gaps might exist with the scored alternatives, and to determine how sensitive the model was to changes. As a demonstration of the approach, seven technologies were scored, representing all three …

Visualizing Early-Stage Breast Cancer Tumors In A Mammographic Environment Through A 3-Dimensional Mathematical Model, Christopher B. Bassham

Theses and Dissertations

In response to the insidious and deadly nature of breast cancer and the less-than-perfect detection ability of mammography, we develop a mathematical model as a foundation to the long-term goal of improving early breast cancer detection. By using modeling and simulation to construct an accurate breast cancer tumor model, we hope to solve the problems associated with mammogram misdiagnosis and, perhaps as a by-product, lend insight to tumor development dynamics. The final tumor model, written in MATLAB, provides realistic tumor growth and 2-dimensional visualization of 3-dimensional structures. Earlier modeling attempts capture slices of the tumor in the 2-dimensional growth spaces. …

Modeling And Analysis Of Aerial Port Operations, Timothy W. Albrecht

Theses and Dissertations

The focus of this thesis effort is gaining useful insight into aerial port operations by employing an animated simulation. Understanding airfield capacity, resources, and functioning allows greater accuracy and efficiency in both planning for future force structures and matching mobility assets with commanders' objectives. Two current simulations, ACE (Airfield Capacity Estimator) and BRACE (Base Resource Allocation and Capabilities Estimator), model mobility activities at the base level with some deficiencies. The model proposed by this thesis, APOM (Aerial Port Operations Model), will provide the mobility analyst an animated simulation with two, new measures of aerial port operations; a real-time estimate of …

Quality Function Deployment From An Operations Research Perspective, Eve M. Burke

Theses and Dissertations

The methodology of Quality Function Deployment (QFD) is compared to operations analysis standards. Of special concern is how Air Combat Command (ACC) uses QFD for the Modernization Planning Process (MPP). ACC digresses from the traditional use of QFD for incorporating quality into manufacturing processes to use it as a planning tool. ACC's goal in implementing QFD is to incorporate the demands of the Air Force mission into the modernization planning effort. ACC's use of QFD to identify and quantify current deficiencies and quantify the value of alternative future solutions has led to the investigation of inconsistencies with QFD, both generally …

A Comparison Of Genetic Algorithm Parametrization On Synthetic Optimization Problems, Mehmet Eravsar

Theses and Dissertations

Meta-heuristics have been deployed to solve many hard combinatorial and optimization problems. Parameterization of meta-heuristics is an important challenging aspect of meta-heuristic use since many of the features of these algorithms cannot be explained theoretically. Experiences with Genetic Algorithms (GA) applied to Multidimensional Knapsack Problems (MKP) have shown that this class of algorithm is very sensitive to parameterization. Many studies use standard test problems, which provide a firm basis for study comparisons but ignore the effect of problem correlation structure. This thesis applies GA to MKP. A new random repair operator, which projects infeasible solutions into feasible region, is proposed. …

A New Sequential Goodness-Of-Fit-Test For The Three-Parameter Weibull Distribution With Known Shape Parameter Value Based On Skewness And Q-Statis G.O.F. Test Statistics, Tibet Memis

Theses and Dissertations

Due to its flexibility, the Weibull distribution has very wide applicability in a lot of disciplines and is very prevalent in reliability theory. Thus, a lot of statistical tests that generally have a substantial degree of computational complexity have been developed to determine if the data at hand can be represented with this distribution. This research presents a new omnibus goodness-of-fit test (G.O.F.) that has less computational complexity than the existing tests for the three-parameter Weibull distribution using a sequential application of two individual tests, sample skewness and Q-Statistic. A Monte Carlo procedure has been employed to generate critical values …

A Decision-Oriented Framework For Evaluating Deployment Strategies For Intelligent Transportation Systems, H.-S. Jacob Tsao

Faculty Publications

Because Intelligent Transportation Systems (ITS) R&D is performed for the ultimate deployment in the real world, deployment issues may limit design options for ITS concepts and technologies and, hence, can be viewed as constraints on ITS R&D. Therefore, ITS deployment issues must be studied at the outset of the R&D process. This paper develops a framework to help recognize and organize such issues. The findings can be used by ITS researchers in developing deployable ITS concepts and technologies and by ITS promoters in deploying ITS technologies having been developed already. Based on a focus on decisions impacting the deployment of …

Acuta Enews February 1999, Vol.28, No. 2

ACUTA Newsletters

In This Issue

Call for Nominations: ACUTA Board of Directors 1999-2000

Levine, McDonalds to Speak at Seminars

Network Challenges for the 21st Century

Overheard on the Listserve

Board Report

Distance Ed Institutes

DC at a Glance

Welcome New Members

Positions Available

A Leader Is a Big Thinker- The Magnet That Attracts Others

Analysis Of A Non-Trivial Queueing Network, Kelly Scott Bellamy

Theses and Dissertations

In studying complex queueing networks, one generally seeks to employ exact analytic solutions to reduce burden on computational resources. Barring the existence of an exact solution, the alternatives include approximation techniques and simulation. Approximation is the more attractive alternative from a time and effort perspective; however, cases exist that are not amiable to this technique. This work increases the flexibility of approximation techniques in obtaining estimates of congestion measures for complex, open queueing networks having several customer classes and class-dependent structures. We accomplish this by providing the procedure to aggregate multiple classes into a single class in order to apply …

Metrics For Estimating The Product Disassembly Effort, Pradeep Kumar Yedlarajaiah

Theses

The concepts of environmentally friendly manufacturing and ecological reuse of materials have resulted in an increase in the number of disposed products that are disassembled. Moreover, the imposition of EPA regulations is forcing companies to invest in methods for protecting the environrnent. The first strategy in this vein is material recycling. The issue of recycling became important because of the limited landfill space, diminishing natural resources, environmental pollution due to dumping of products containing hazardous materials. Likewise, it is projected that the cost of extracting materials from natural resources is going to be much more expensive when compared to reclaiming …

Worn Tool Forces Based On Ploughing Stresses, Daniel Waldorf, Shiv G. Kapoor, Richard E. Devor

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Recent work in modeling of the ploughing mechanism in basic metal machining may provide a means of estimating the additional forces to be expected when cutting with a worn tool. The results predict the rubbing stresses due to the finite radius of an unworn tool edge. Since an unworn tool can be thought of as a worn tool with a wear land width VB = 0, these stresses can make up part of a strategy for predicting the additional forces incurred by a worn tool. This paper develops a wear model by proposing a technique for utilizing the stresses predicted …

Acuta Enews January 1999, Vol.28, No. 1

ACUTA Newsletters

In This Issue

High Priorities for '99

Board Report

Making Choices: ATM vs. Gigabit Ethernet

Overheard on the Listserve: Is VoIP for Me?

DC at a Glance

Positions Available

Welcome New Members

Universal Translations Service

Use Telephone Wires To Create a Household Network

Information, Please

High Speed Networking

ACUTA Member Needs Assessment: Members are Highly Satisfied with ACUTA Services

Facility Layout Of Irregular-Shaped Departments Using A Nested Approach, Alan Mckendall, James Noble, Cerry Klein

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

The facility layout problem is a very difficult and widely studied optimization problem. As a result, many facility layout models and techniques have been developed. However, the literature does not fully consider or control irregular-shaped departments. In this paper, the nested facility layout problem is defined whereby irregular-shaped departments(i.e. L-shaped, O-shaped or U-shaped) can be generated and controlled. This is a unique problem that can be used to efficiently layout workstations, storage areas and other departments within departments, while arranging the departments with respect to an objective. The objective considered here is to minimize material handling cost. We present a …

Spatial And Temporal Factors In Estimating The Potential Of Ride-Sharing For Demand Reduction, H.-S. Jacob Tsao, Da-Jie Lin

Faculty Publications

Traffic congestion has been a pervasive problem in many urban areas of this country. This paper studies the potential of carpooling among unrelated partners (i.e., inter-household carpooling) for demand reduction during peak commute hours. Basic questions about this potential include the following. Can the current population density, origin-destination distribution, tolerable pick-up and drop-off delays, departure time distribution, and the tolerance for deviation from preferred departure time support a sizable carpooling population that can make a significant contribution to traffic demand reduction? Could the proportion of long trips that are likely candidates for carpooling (e.g., those long trips with same O-D) …

A Biologically Inspired Connectionist Model For Image Feature Extraction In 2d Pattern Recognition, Cihan H. Dagli, Raymond K. Chafin

Engineering Management and Systems Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

A new edge detection method is presented which borrows from recent research into primate vision biology, and offers improved noise performance over classical methods. Beginning with spatio-temporal shunting models for retinal cones, horizontal cells, bipolar cells, and retinal ganglions, a set of simplified steady-state solutions are developed which lend themselves to efficient computation on standard computer equipment. The retinal model output is found to be nominally equivalent to the classical edge detector, but is produced differently. A simplified model of the lateral geniculate nucleus (LGN) has been produced. Taking the output of the retinal model, the LGN simple cell and …

Short-Term Generation Asset Valuation, Chung-Li Tseng, G. Barz

Engineering Management and Systems Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

We present a method for valuing a power plant over a short term period using Monte Carlo simulation. The power plant valuation problem is formulated as a multi stage stochastic problem. We assume there are hourly markets for both electricity and the fuel used by the generator, and their prices follow some Ito processes. At each hour, the power plant operator must decide to run or not to run the unit so as to maximize expected profit. A certain lead time for commitment decision is necessary to start up a unit. The commitment decision, once made, is subject to physical …

Integrated Manufacturing System For Precision Press Tooling, S. Chaturvedi, Venkat Allada

Engineering Management and Systems Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

The press tooling industry, characterized by many small-scale job-shops, is facing an increasingly competitive global market. This comes at a time when there is a shortage of experienced process planners and unavailability of affordable CAD/CAM systems that could provide an integrated solution for manufacturing sheet metal tooling. Many commercially available CAD/CAM systems are either too expensive or too narrow in scope, in the sense that they provide only point solutions. The design of press tools and its manufacturing functions are highly specialized and knowledge-intensive in nature. This paper presents a framework and the implementation details of an integrated system that …

Value-Based Product Structure Evaluation For Disassembly, Shivakumar Viswanathan, Venkat Allada

Engineering Management and Systems Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Designing for the ease of end of life (EOL) disassembly is an important design function. The product structure that is the spatial relationships between the parts of the product and the value distribution over them plays an important role in determining the ease and profitability of disassembly. This paper presents a conceptual methodology to determine the effect of the spatial precedence on the desired value precedence of the product. The methodology introduces a digraph called the bureau graph to model this relationship between the spatial and value precedence structures. Based on this modeling indices are derived that provide a holistic …

Models In Manual Materials Handling, M. M. Ayoub, Jeffrey C. Woldstad

Department of Industrial and Management Systems Engineering: Faculty Publications

The ergonomics approach to manual materials handling (MMH) tasks defines a Man-Task-Environment System. A generally accepted means of minimizing MMH related injuries is to design MMH tasks so that the demands of the tasks are less than the capacities of the individuals performing these tasks. Task design is dependent, in part, on the availability of comparable data for task demands and worker capacities. The generation of the appropriate data is dependent, in part, on being able to identify the pertinent capacity parameters of manual materials handling activities.

In the past, a substantial effort has been directed at determining ‘safe’ lifting …

Transition Criteria - From A Pit To A Crack, Tarun Goswami, David W. Hoeppner

Biomedical, Industrial & Human Factors Engineering Faculty Publications

A brief review of pitting, which is a localized corrosion process resulting from pitting and fatigue interaction has been conducted in this paper. The transition of a pit to a crack is a very important phenomenon occurring under PCF conditions. Various theories for transition of a pit to a crack were examined within the limits of present understanding and limitations of the models. The transition of a pit to a crack was also discussed for a variety of pit shapes utilizing the pit aspect ratios, defect size and linear elastic fracture mechanics, crack tip characterizing parameters such as Mode I …

Combining Wavelets And Hotelling Transforms In Image Query, Sol Neeman Ph.D.

Engineering Studies Faculty Publications and Creative Works

In the "content based" image query, also referred to as "query by example," "similarity retrieval" or "sketch retrieval," the query image is provided by the user either as a sketch of the object, as the output of a scanner or a video camera. Some of the difficulties associated with content based image query are described in [1], e.g. significant difference between the "query image" and the "target image," artifacts and poor resolution of the query image make a straightforward comparison of images using L1 and l2 metrics not effective.

In [2] a new strategy is suggested based on wavelet decomposition …

Flange Bolt Failure Analysis, Tarun Goswami

Biomedical, Industrial & Human Factors Engineering Faculty Publications

Failure cause investigation of flange bolts from the bi-axial shaft fatigue test rig was carried out and crack growth rates in combined bending and torsion conditions were determined. Flange bolts are used in gas turbine engines that are pre-torqued exerting bending and torsion fatigue situation arising from high centrifugal stresses. The fracture surface features were characteristic of bending fatigue (BF), where striations were observed, a distinct area within which conjoint bending and torsion fatigue (CBTF) features were documented, and a region between the BF and CBTF, a region of overloading (OL), where ductile dimples were observed. Striations dominated within BF …

An Analysis Of Sustained Collaborative Research Activities Between University Organized Research Units And Industry: A Case Study Of Three Institutions, Elizabeth Taraski Mcdonnell

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

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Loss Detection In The Dairy Industry., Michael Quealy

Theses

In any waste management program, the primary objective must be minimizing product loss without having an affect on product quality. Good waste management is recognized as good manufacturing practice and optimizes the processes to gain the highest possible yield from the available raw materials. A good waste management program must involve the daily monitoring of effluent from the plant for volume and strength. This data needs to be analyzed sufficiently to obtain clear pictures of what problems are present and where they are originating. If this is achieved then the task of reducing the product loss is made much easier. …