Through passive adaptation to incidental flow, flexible aerodynamic surfaces exploit effects of increased lift, delayed stall and disturbance rejection. Wings of birds, bats, and insects exhibit these passive effects, and at the same time through the use of structural state feedback sensed from the loads on the wing, active control...
The purpose of this qualitative study was to research the experience of six Hispanic students who were interviewed in depth regarding their persistence in school and success at a community college. The students reported on their educational experiences prior to college and how that related to attendance at the college;...
Frost injury is one of the major factors limiting potato production in many parts
of the world. It would be desirable to transfer the frost-tolerance traits from the hardy
relatives to the cultivated potato, however, progress has been very slow. Since Solanum
commersonii has been the major source of frost...
Today nano scale materials are being used for wide range of applications. One promising topic in nano scale materials is using them for reinforcement of different polymeric materials to reach desirable stiffness properties. The stiffness of these materials is mostly found experimentally because the nanocomposite community lacks a decent analytical...
Engineers have long been inspired by nature's flyers. Such animals navigate complex environments gracefully and efficiently by using a variety of evolutionary adaptations for high-performance flight. Biologists have discovered a variety of sensory adaptations that provide flow state feedback and allow flying animals to feel their way through flight. A...
The focus of this thesis is to design, characterize, and apply novel computational methods and molecular systems to interrogate heterogeneous human gut microbiome-related phenomena. In Chapter 2, I design, implement, and characterize a method for embedding co-occurrence patterns derived from massive 16s amplicon datasets. I use this method to 1....
During the Colonial Period, in Mexico there was no rational
forest development policy and, as a result, forest resources were
squandered and to a considerable extent destroyed. During the
Nineteenth Century, a rational forest policy began to be promoted, but
in the end, it was translated into a policy of...
Recognizing human actions in videos is a long-standing problem in computer vision with a wide range of applications including video surveillance, content retrieval, and sports analysis. This thesis focuses on addressing efficiency and robustness of video classification in unconstrained real-world settings. The thesis work can be broadly divided into four...
This dissertation has focused on lignin byproducts that result from the alkali processing of wheat straw. The first study evaluated the application of “standard” lignin quantification methods for summative analyses of alkali-based processes. Mass closure during NaOH processing at 25, 50, and 75°C of wheat straw was evaluated using the...
As modern systems continue to increase in size and complexity, they pose significant safety and risk management challenges. System engineers and much of the government research efforts are focused on understanding the attributes and characteristics that emerge from the interactions of components and subsystems. As a result, the objective of...