EET Senior Design Project - IMS Dynamic Display

Indiana University Purdue University IndianapolisThe Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum has a display transmission that is still actively used in IndyCar today. The museum wants to incorporate this transmission into an interactive display, so guests of all ages can see internal gears spin as well as see the transmission shift between its gears. This project includes mechanical and electrical engineering technology students working together to mount wire motors and sensors. The transmission will have a user-friendly interface allowing the guests to change gears and to turn the transmission on and off. The transmission will be driven by a 24V DC motor and uses a 24V DC linear actuator to rotate a barrel cam to change the position of the forks, allowing the gears to get shifted up and down. A metal enclosure houses the electrical components that provide power and control to the system. The outcome of this project is a failsafe and robust system that will operate within the IMS Museum while being continually updated.Electrical Engineering Technolog

THE POVERTY OF APPLIED POLICY ANALYSIS

Agricultural and Food Policy,

A BIOECONOMIC SIMULATION ANALYSIS OF IRRIGATION INVESTMENTS

Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Systems aspects of COBE science data compression

A general approach to compression of diverse data from large scientific projects has been developed and this paper addresses the appropriate system and scientific constraints together with the algorithm development and test strategy. This framework has been implemented for the COsmic Background Explorer spacecraft (COBE) by retrofitting the existing VAS-based data management system with high-performance compression software permitting random access to the data. Algorithms which incorporate scientific knowledge and consume relatively few system resources are preferred over ad hoc methods. COBE exceeded its planned storage by a large and growing factor and the retrieval of data significantly affects the processing, delaying the availability of data for scientific usage and software test. Embedded compression software is planned to make the project tractable by reducing the data storage volume to an acceptable level during normal processing

Novel Solid-Phase Extraction Techniques for Biological and Environmental Analysis Using Isotope Dilution Mass Spectrometry

Awareness and study of the ways in which the environment can interact with the personal genetics and epigenetics of an individual has grown substantially in recent years, resulting in the field of Exposomics. In an era of increasingly personalized medicine, novel techniques are necessary to ensure the accurate and sensitivity measurement of clinically and environmentally relevant molecules in biological and environmental samples. Addressing existing shortcomings cited in literature, methods were developed and optimized for the extraction, separation, mass analysis, and quantification of a suite of environmental organic pollutants in both biological and environmental samples, with the primary objective of improving accuracy, increasing sensitivity, and reducing sample and reagent consumption. The secondary objective of this research was the production of validated methods capable of inter-laboratory method transfer with minimal training required in the receiving laboratory. Two novel methods have been developed, optimized, validated, and applied to collaborative environmental research. These novel methods represented a demonstrative improvement upon existing methods in both analytical quality and capability for inter-laboratory method transfer. Both developed methods were utilized in two collaborative clinical research studies investigating the impact of environmentally-sources agents on children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorders (ASD). The high-quality data obtained in these studies yielded results that may have provided valuable insight into the development and maintenance of autism spectrum disorders. These novel methods allowed for the discovery of a first-of-its-kind variable in the children with ASD, compared with controls. This variable was statistically predictive for the probability of an individual being diagnosed with the most behaviorally severe autism disorder, with a statistically significant overall model fit. This novel analytical method was then expanded in breadth through application to industrial and municipal wastewater to aid in updating EPA Method 625 for wastewater analysis. Applying this novel method to wastewater produced data of higher analytical quality, in both accuracy and precision, compared with all other collaborative laboratories. The methods developed in this work for the quantification of organic molecules implicated in environmental human health in biological and environmental samples have significantly improved analytically upon existing methods and have yielded clinically relevant findings in collaborative clinical research studies

The Deadly Influenza Virus and Its Changing Forms

The influenza virus has plagued humans for centuries. Recently antiviral medications, which shorten the duration of the flu, have been introduced into society. These medications along with vaccinations, which try to give the body immunity before the virus strikes, help to stop the flu before it attacks the host. The virus, however, replicates using host cells and can slightly change itself with each replication, which over time could lead to a strain immune to the current antiviral medication and vaccines. However, using more preventative measures could help slow the changing strains of the flu virus. Using vaccines to stop the virus at the host before it mutates and using antiviral medication before the flu starts replicating inside patients are both examples of preventative measures. In the future, research must be focused on creating vaccines to limit the need for antiviral medication to slow the evolution process of the influenza virus overall