Project Title:

Evaluating the Architectural Design Quality of Object-Oriented Software

Principal Investigator:

James Bieman, Associate Professor
Department of Computer Science
Colorado State University

Collaborating Companies:

Storage Technology

Company Representative:

Ernie Sandovall

We will develop techniques to evaluate the quality of the architectural designs of object-oriented software systems. Our focus is on identifying design structures and patterns that will make the software easier to adapt and test. We will develop our techniques through design pattern recognition and measurement, and an examination of a specific software system developed by the collaborating company. We will also develop and evaluate methods for reconstructing software architectural designs from implementations, based, in part, on design-pattern recognition.

Project Title:

Software-Based Simulator for Carrier Interference Multiple Access (CIMA)

Principal Investigator:

Carl Nassar, Assistant Professor
Electrical Engineering
Colorado State University

Collaborating Companies:

Granularity Information Architecture

Company Representative:

Steve Shattil, Chief Data Architect

Direct Sequence (DS) Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) has gained widespread popularity in the multi-billion dollar wireless telecommunication industry. Recently, MC (Multiple Carrier) CDMA has emerged as an attractive alternative to DS CDMA, and one of its most promising implementations is CIMA (Carrier Interference Multiple Access), for which Idris Communications has exclusive license This proposal, pending support, researches and develops software-based models for CIMA transmitters, channels, receivers, phase estimators, timing estimators, power control schemes, and antenna array technologies. This proposal includes the testing and performance analysis of CIMA, based on the software models developed herein. Results from this proposal provide Idris Communications with the necessary first step toward the successful deployment of CIMA.

Project Title:

Computationally Efficient Algorithms for Managing Sensor Information that Incorporate Models of Data Association

Principal Investigators:

Lucy Pao, Assistant Professor
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
University of Colorado - Boulder

Collaborating Company:

Data Fusion Corporation

Company Representative:

John Thomas

Multiple sensors in surveillance and tracking systems often provide more information than can be processed with the available computational resources. Recently, a few sensor manager algorithms have been proposed to address this problem by determining which subset of sensor data should be processed to yield good performance while not overtaxing the computational resources. The sensor managers developed thus far, however, have been computationally demanding themselves. Moreover, they do not directly take into account the effects of data association processes that are required in many surveillance and tracking systems. We propose (1) to model and evaluate the effect that various data association methods have on the covariances of target state estimates, (2) to incorporate these models in developing more practical algorithms for managing sensor information, and (3) to analyze the computations required in sensor manager algorithms and develop efficient means for implementing them.

Project Title:

Enhanced Knee Prothesis Design Through Telemetric Patella

Principal Investigator:

Rahmat Shoureshi, Professor
Division of Engineering
Institute of Biomedical Devices & Musculoskeletal Systems
Colorado School of Mines

Collaborating Company:

Rose Musculoskeletal Research Laboratory

Company Representative:

Richard Komistek, Director of Development

Studies on total knee arthroplasty (TKA) failures document that contact stresses exceed the yield strength of the polyethylene. Excessive patellofemoral loads of up to seven or eight times body weight, during certain activities, have been estimated. Although research for identification of better materials for TKA joints is essential, what is even more important is the determination of exact joint forces and stresses to define the required materials specifications. This study would process a pioneering effort in analysis and design of a telemetric patella that would provide exact information about TKA joint forces and stresses. Computer-aided modeling of lower extremity to simulate joint motions, real-time signal analysis, wireless information transfer, self calibration, and feedback control, will be technological challenges that will be invented in this study. During the first year of this research, effort will be focused on the software development for modeling kinematic and dynamic of the lower extremity. Results from this study will be used to develop the proposed telemetric patella.

Project Title:

A Module for Analysis and Design of Segmental Prestressed Concrete Bridges

Principal Investigator:

Enrico Spacone, Assistant Professor
Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering
University of Colorado - Boulder

Collaborating Company:

Finley McNary Engineers, Inc.

Company Representative:

W. Scott McNary, Principal

This project develops a new module for analysis and design of segmental prestressed concrete bridges. The module is developed around an existing finite element code. The capabilities of the finite element program will be applied to segmental construction, in which different segments of the structure are added at different times. The module will include: a) a prestressed concrete element with piecewise linear post-tensioned tendons; b) nonlinear material laws for concrete, steel and friction; c) time dependent behavior of concrete and steel; d) time dependent construction sequence. The module will be driven by fully graphic pre- and post-processors that will greatly ease the input preparation and the interpretation of the results. The proposed module is the first step in an effort to build a comprehensive software for analysis and design of prestressed concrete structures.

Project Title:

Ultrasonic Damage simulation in Engineering Materials

Principal Investigator:

Kaspar Willam , Professor
Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering
University of Colorado - Boulder

Collaborating Companies:

APTEK Incorporated

Company Representative:

Yvonne Murray, Project Manager

We propose to develop a graphics-oriented simulation package for quantitative ultrasonics. In short an "Ultrasonic Damage Simulator", to evaluate material degradation in terms of propagative material properties. Examples of ultrasonic damage experiments include damage assessment of civil and aerospace structures, where stiffness degradation provides an indicator of the health and life cycle performance of structural components and structural systems.

To this end, the " Ultrasonic Damage Simulator" will evaluate and graphically display phase velocities diagrams (slowness surfaces) in engineering materials that are deteriorating due to mechanical and environmental loadings. Along this line, the driver will establish a testbed to interrogate in a quantitative manner constitutive relations for a wide variety of material formulations with regard to their propagative properties.

The software will be developed on a SUN platform and will be written in Fortran 90 and in C++ using Open GL/Open Inventor for visualization and animation. In the second phase of the project, we intend to download the "Ultrasonic Simulator" to high end PC's that are widely used in engineering practice and classroom environments.

Project Title:

Model-Based Wavelet Processing for Seismic Surveys

Principal Investigator:

Ray Zhang, Assistant Professor
Division of Engineering
Colorado School of Mines

Collaborating Company:

Western Geophysical

Company Representative:

Douglas Hart, Senior Research Geophysicist

Among new seismic survey techniques, a framework of model-based wavelet processing proposed recently by D.I. Hart has been showing its promising applications in oil/gas exploration. However, solid understanding has not been achieved on dynamite source mechanism, wavelet generation, and consequent wave propagation through the earth medium with irregular surface/sub-surfaces and laterally-heterogeneous medium properties, which might significantly affect the quality of seismic survey. In view of limited time and resources, the following four tasks will be carried out during the award period, which present technical challenges that are highly relevant and common to interdisciplinary seismic survey:

(1) Exploration of source mechanism and establishment of appropriate source model. In this subject, whether or not the wavelet generated by a dynamic source could be modeled as a dipole, sweep, or others in time will be carefully examined, which depends strongly on different type of dynamite source as well as its environments.

(2) Development of a realistic earth medium model accountable for irregular surface/sub-surfaces and/or lateral heterogeneity. This could be accomplished by implementing a 3D model for wave propagation in a layered half-space with irregular surface/sub-surfaces and/or laterally-heterogeneous medium (developed by Zhang in the past decade) into Hart's wavelet model, attempting to enable the model-based wavelet processing to capture each and every essential characteristic of wave propagation in a realistic earth medium.

(3) Comprehensive understanding of the roles of physical parameters. This could be fulfilled by carrying out extensive parametric studies and thus quantifying various multiple interactive effects including signal, noise, instrumentation filters, and reflectivity sequence.

(4) Validation and calibration of the model-based wavelet processing technique. This could be achieved by comparing the synthetic data via model-based wavelet processing with observed seismic data.

Project Title:

Reinforced Soil Design: Integration of Digital Image Analysis, Numerical Modeling and Limit Equilibrium

Principal Investigator:

Jorge Zornberg, Assistant Professor
Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering
University of Colorado - Boulder

Collaborating Company:

Bowman Construction Supplies, Inc.

Company Representative:

David Bowman

Soil reinforcement is now a highly attractive alternative for highway embankment and retaining wall projects because of the economic benefits it offers in relation to conventional retaining structures. Reinforced soil design is typically performed using computational techniques (limit equilibrium), which require significant assumption regarding strain distributions within the reinforcements. However, to date, the assumed strain distributions have not been fully validated against monitored results. One consequence of this is a perceived overconservatism in design.

The overall objective of this CASI Technology Transfer plan is to generate and integrate, via advanced software technology, strain data that will provide a definite answer regarding reinforcement strain distributions to be adopted in design. Specifically, this project will integrate the results from: (i) A digital processing effort involving images of reinforced soil models videotaped in-flight during testing in a geotechnical centrifuge; (ii) a numerical (finite element) modeling validation of the digital data collected in the previous phase; and (iii) a limit equilibrium investigation that will incorporate reinforcement strain distributions drawn from the previous two phases into a still practical, though more accurate reinforced soil design methodology.