Development of a Flow Duration Curve to Determine Hydropower Feasibility

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Susan Estep with Elise Estep and Dr. Jim Nelson, Civil and Environmental Engineering The purpose of this project was to derive Flow Duration Curves (FDCs) by three separate methods in order to compare the accuracy of these methods. The FDCs would be used to estimate the amount of water that would be consistently available for […]

Droplets Rolling on Superhydrophobic Inclines Simulating Real World Application Environments

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Braquel Burnett and Faculty Mentor: Julie Crockett, Mechanical Engineering Superhydrophobic surfaces offer unique characteristics such as extreme water repellency, drag reduction and enhanced condensation rates. These effects are possible due to a combination of micro/nano-texturing and a hydrophobic chemical coating. With the advent of micro/nano-fabrication, research and development on superhydrophobic surfaces has sky-rocketed due to […]

The Influence of Crystallographic Constraints on Percolation

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Jarrod Lund and Faculty Mentor: Oliver Johnson, Mechanical Engineering Introduction Within polycrystalline materials (e.g. metals and ceramics), grain boundary networks (GBN) influence the effective properties such as diffusion, conductivity, and crack and creep propagation1. In precision applications such as jet engine turbine blades and solid oxide fuel cells, understanding and characterizing GBN are essential for […]

Energy from Thin Air: Compressed Air Power Harvesting Systems

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Zachary Sadler and Faculty Mentor: Matthew Jones, Mechanical Engineering Introduction Energy is an important resource within the world we live. The demand for power requires new energy resources. Much of the power that is generated is eventually wasted in the form of waste heat. As much as 435 GW of energy is transferred from virtually […]

Charge-Steering CMOS Amplifier Design and Testing Final Report

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Nathan Whitehead and Shiuhhua Wood Chiang, Electrical & Computer Engineering Project Overview The goal of this research was to demonstrate that the complementary and 4-stage amplifiers can achieve superior gain or speed over the 2-stage charge-steering amplifier in [1], and the conventional differential amplifier introduced in the ORCA grant proposal. The completion of this project has […]

MEG Report: Elastic Frames for Earthquake Resistance

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Paul Richards, Civil and Environmental Engineering Project Topic and Objective The topic of the proposal was steel frames with superior elastic energy capacity that will permit buildings to better withstand severe earthquake loading. The anticipated outcomes related to mentoring were: each student researcher would be the lead author on a conference publication, students would present […]

Mentored Environment for Isogeometric Analysis

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Kevin Tew and Michael Scott The mentored environment for isogeometric analysis (IGA) has trained engineering and computer science students to develop isogeometric numerical methods and accompanying software to solve challenging problems in science and engineering. The mentoring environment consisted of: Weekly group meetings where research concepts were discussed, scientific literature was reviewed, and progress was […]

Intensive Mentoring and Micro-Electronics Research for Students in Engineering (IMMERSE) 2014

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Aaron Hawkins and Stephen Schultz, Electrical and Computer Engineering Project Description The MEG funds used for this projects supported undergraduate students working in the IMMERSE program starting in the Summer of 2014. IMMERSE employed a total of 35 students, with 14 of them being supervised directly by Dr. Aaron Hawkins and Stephen Schultz. The students […]

Human Fibroblast Cell Adhesion to Extracellular Matrix

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Brady Vance and Alonzo Cook, Chemical Engineering Heart disease, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is the number one cause of death in the United States, killing more than 600,000 people each year1. Due to the high incidence of heart disease and the low availability of transplantable hearts, new technologies have been […]

3D Printed Alginate Scaffolds in Regenerative Medicine Techniques

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Tyler Hendricks and Dr. Alonzo Cook, Chemical Engineering Introduction Mostly an exploratory project, the goal of this study was to determine the best combination of preparation temperature and concentration of alginate gel to be used with 3D printing technologies in tissue engineering and future regenerative medicine techniques. Recognizing the role that 3D printing technologies could […]